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A contaminated medicine is suspected of being linked to the deaths of 99 children in Indonesia this year, the country's Food and Drug Monitoring Agency announced in a statement obtained by the Associated Press on Thursday (October 20).
The agency said it found that five medicinal syrups used to treat fevers, coughs and colds had ethylene glycol levels "that exceeded the safe threshold" among a total of 26 traced.
The Health Ministry announced it had banned all five of the syrup medicines as of Wednesday (October 19) and vowed to work alongside the food and drug agency in order to prohibit the issue from taking place again, Health Minister Budi Gunadi Sadikin said via the AP.
A total of 206 cases of acute kidney injury have been reported among children in Indonesia this year, which includes a death rate of 48%, the Health Ministry confirmed in its statement on Wednesday.
“Previously, there were only a few cases of kidney injuries, only one or two every month. But at the end of August there was a spike in cases that got our attention. It is an atypical progressive acute kidney injury. We call it atypical as the cause is still under investigation or unknown,” said Mohammad Syahril, a spokesperson from the Health Ministry.
The Food and Drug Monitoring Agency did, however, caution that other risk factors have been linked to acute kidney injury as well and plans to work alongside the Ministry of Health, pharmaceutical experts, clinical pharmacology experts, the Indonesian Pediatrician Association and other groups in order to determine more information about risk factors.