The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) heavily regulates the drugs that are manufactured in the United States. The facilities where these products are made and the processes that are used to do so face scrutiny and evaluation by FDA investigators on a regular basis, but the same cannot be said for the medications that are made outside our borders and imported into our country.
The FDA only has a handful of inspectors who can conduct investigations into the safety and quality of medications that are being made. It’s enough of a struggle for them to regularly inspect the manufacturing facilities in the United States, much less those in other countries. Unfortunately, this lack of oversight can often lead to errors being made that can cause a patient to suffer a serious drug injury.
The New York Times highlighted a case where a heart drug that was manufactured in India was being recalled because patients were suffering serious adverse health events after consuming the product. Drug manufacturing giant—GlaxoSmithKline USA—also recently recalled three lots of an antidepressant drug that was manufactured in Romania and distributed through a Filipino company due the possibility that the drug “adulterated”.
At Ferrer, Poirot & Wansbrough, our drug injury attorneys say the best way to prevent a drug injury caused by a defective medication is to use a name brand product. You can also check to see if your medication has recently been recalled by visiting the FDA’s website.