Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Mohan Yadav on Thursday alleged that the Tamil Nadu government was not cooperating with the investigation into the deaths of 22 children linked to the consumption of Coldrif cough syrup, PTI reported.

The deaths were reported after several children, who had been suffering from fever and cold, consumed the syrup manufactured by Sresan Pharmaceutical Manufacturer in Tamil Nadu’s Kanchipuram district, resulting in vomiting and difficulty in urinating.

The first death was recorded on September 2. Deaths have also been reported in Rajasthan.

Of the 22 deaths reported in Madhya Pradesh, two were from Betul and one from Pandhurna district, while 19 were from Chhindwara. Three children, who allegedly consumed the syrup, are critical and undergoing treatment in Nagpur, Maharashtra.

On Thursday, the Madhya Pradesh Police arrested the owner of the pharmaceutical company, G Ranganathan, in Chennai.

Yadav said that while the Madhya Pradesh Police had made arrests “where the medicine was manufactured”, the Tamil Nadu government “is not cooperating the way it should”, PTI reported. “The Tamil Nadu Drug Controller should conduct a regulatory investigation of the pharmaceutical company,” he said.

Yadav added: “The government where these medicines are manufactured should take concrete steps and proper action.”

On October 2, the Tamil Nadu director of drug control found that Coldrif samples were not of standard quality. Three days later, Madhya Pradesh also reported that one sample of Coldrif had 48.6% of diethylene glycol in it.

The permissible limit of diethylene glycol as an impurity is 0.1%. However, drug officials Scroll spoke to said that the chemical is unsafe even in trace amounts and should ideally be completely absent from an ingestible syrup. Its presence is a serious quality compliance issue, the officials said.

The formulation has now been banned in eight states – Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh, Kerala, Karnataka, Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Puducherry.

Also read: How adulterated cough syrup killed Madhya Pradesh’s children

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