Tainted Pills Hit US Mainland

Tech.Luver notes an AP story on tainted pills that have arrived in the US from — not China this time — Puerto Rico. The article details a disturbing number of incidents of contamination investigated by the FDA over the last few years. "The first warning sign came when a sharp-eyed worker sorting pills noticed that the odd blue flecks dotting the finished drug capsules matched the paint on the factory doors. After the flecks were spotted again on the capsules, a blood-pressure medication called Diltiazem, the plant began placing covers over drugs in carts in its manufacturing areas. But the factory owner, Canadian drug maker Biovail Corp., never tried to find out whether past shipments of the drug were contaminated — or prevent future contamination, according to US regulators... FDA officials say the problems in Puerto Rico are proportionate with the large number of pharmaceutical plants here and generally no worse than those on the US mainland."

Comments

Re:Article Mentions Problems in U.S. Also

[Red Flayer]

Nice troll.

Not sure if your error was intentional, but I bet it was... sure to get a lot of responses.

You want the FDA to get anal retentive on your medications, fine. Just realize those expensive drugs are going to get a little more expensive and sick people who are poor might not be able to afford them anymore.

That's horsepoop. Manufacturing costs of prescription medications are a small fraction of the total cost, except for orphan drugs with low usage. High-volume drugs, such as the ones mentioned in TFA, have an extremely small unit cost in relation to market price. R&D, marketing, even admin overhead dwarf manufacturing costs.

Another fine post from EDJ. Full of inaccuracies, conjecture, and trite sentences devoid of real meaning.

/Disgusted with myself for feeding the troll.