Families sue over fake-drug deaths

Families of 10 patients killed by or exposed to a counterfeit drug at a Guangzhou hospital have sued the hospital for a combined 20 million yuan.

At least 64 patients treated for a severe liver illness at Guangzhou's Sun Yat-sen University's No 3 Affiliated Hospital in late April and early May last year were given injections of a fake form of Armillarisin A, a drug used for liver, gall bladder and gastric ailments. Thirteen of the patients died, most of them from kidney failure.

The drug scandal has underscored widespread irregularities within the pharmaceutical industry on the mainland during the reign of the former director of the State Food and Drug Administration, Zheng Xiaoyu , who was sentenced to death yesterday for accepting bribes.

The manufacturer of the botched injections, the Qiqihar No 2 Pharmaceutical Company, lost its licence following the scandal. The company, based in Heilongjiang province, has also been linked to at least 100 deaths in Panama from a toxic cough syrup that included fake glycerin, which was actually diethylene glycol, believed to have originated in Jiangsu province.

The incident raised an international alert over the safety of the mainland's exports.

A court hearing for the Guangdong compensation case was postponed for a day on Monday after the hospital lodged an application with the Tianhe District People's Court to include the Qiqihar No 2 Pharmaceutical Company and a Guangdong-based drug distributor as co-defendants, Xinhua reported.