Fourteen more children from Madhya Pradesh’s Chhindwara district are fighting for their lives in hospitals across Nagpur after suffering kidney failure allegedly caused by the now-banned cough syrup Coldrif.
In Chhindwara, three more children died on Sunday after allegedly consuming the deadly cough syrup, taking the toll to 14. Accordign to media reports, Chhindwara, which has a newly inaugurated medical college, several hospitals and private clinics, doesn’t have a single dialysis unit.
According to doctors at Government Medical College and Hospital (GMCH) Nagpur, lab tests confirmed that the six children who died there had renal failure due to diethylene glycol (DEG) poisoning.
The syrup samples were found to contain 48.6% DEG, a highly toxic chemical used in brake fluids and antifreeze. The children had initially been thought to suffer from acute encephalitis syndrome (AES), but when doctors noticed that many of them had zero urine output after a bout of cough and fever, they began investigating further.
Following the deaths, the Maharashtra government banned Coldrif, which is manufactured by Sresan Pharma in Tamil Nadu’s Kancheepuram district.
The Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) is also preparing to issue an advisory to all doctors, warning them not to prescribe cough syrups to children under five years unless absolutely necessary.
Dr Manish Tiwari, head of the paediatrics department at GMCH, said that three children are currently on ventilator support, while two others are in critical condition.
Meanwhile, Dr Shashikant Shambharkar, Deputy Director of Health Services, said that 14 children are undergoing treatment in both government and private hospitals in Nagpur.
"We have instructed all public health hospitals in Nagpur, spanning six districts, not to prescribe this syrup. However, none of our hospitals had any supply or stock of Coldrif. No renal failure cases among children from Nagpur or Vidarbha districts have been reported. We only have sporadic AES cases from some Vidarbha districts, but they are not related to cough syrup," Dr Shambharkar was quoted by TOI as saying.
Paediatric intensivist Dr Anupam Bahe, who treated six affected children at Nelson Hospital, said that besides Coldrif, some of the patients had also been given two other local cough syrup brands, and two of those children remain in critical condition after being shifted to other hospitals.
Authorities in Nagpur have launched strict surveillance and monitoring measures to ensure no contaminated syrups are being sold or prescribed.
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