The director of the government’s medical supplies department, Dr Kapila Wickramanayake, said the government moved swiftly to recall the anesthetic drug that caused the death of a young mother giving birth.
The incident took place at the Peradeniya Hospital.
The decision to withdraw the drug from use follows a written directive issued by the director of the National Medical Regulatory Authority.
Dr. Wickramanayake said that this drug, which was recently brought to Sri Lanka from an Indian pharmaceutical company under the Indian credit line, has been distributed to hospitals across the country, and all the drugs so distributed have now been temporarily withdrawn from use.
The National Medicines Regulatory Authority states that the drugs brought to Sri Lanka under the Indian credit line had not undergone quality control tests in Sri Lanka. However, the drug literature and other evidence relating to the usage of the drug in other countries have been checked before approval was given to use the same in Sri Lanka.
Dr. Wickramanayake now says that there is a serious shortage of anaesthetic drugs in hospitals due to the withdrawal of the anesthetic drugs brought to the country under the Indian credit line.
In a bid to cover the shortage, 40,000 injections, which have already been received as aid from the Myanmar government, have been distributed to the hospital.
The director points out that the emergence of a shortage of anesthetic drugs cannot be prevented due to this situation.
The drug received as a grant from the Myanmar government has not gone through quality testing in the laboratories of this country either, but the literature and relevant documents have been thoroughly perused, and the countries that have used the injection have been fully checked before the National Medicines Regulatory Authority gave its green light to use the drug.
