VISAKHAPATNAM: Drugs Control authorities seized around 5,900 bottles of Rivicold cold/cough syrup worth Rs 4.5 lakh from Kirby Life Sciences, a wholesale medical agency at Marripalem, on Monday. The syrup was banned for children below four years.
Director General, Drugs Control Department Girisha, instructed the officials to conduct a raid under the supervision of Assistant Director of Drugs Control, Vizag, S Vijaya Kumar, and Drugs Inspector M Srinivas Rao.
Srinivas Rao said the seized syrup bottles contain Chlorpheniramine Maleate and Phenylephrine Hydrochloride, manufactured by Bajaj Formulations, Bhagwanpur, Roorkee, Haridwar, Uttarakhand. ‘The label failed to carry the mandatory warning ‘Not to be used for children below four years of age.’ Due to this omission, there is a potential risk of it being administered to small children,” he added.
Rao said authorities have registered a case against the manufacturer under Section 26A of the Drugs and Cosmetics Act. It will be produced before the court for further orders.
He warned that following recent child deaths in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan due to contaminated cough syrups, “stringent legal action will be taken against any licencee selling prohibited combinations, and no cold/cough syrup for children should be sold without a valid prescription from a registered medical practitioner.”
The operation was conducted jointly by a teams of officials from the Police and Drugs Control departments.