Shortly before a national fungal meningitis outbreak was linked to New England Compounding Center, the Framingham company sent customers a “Quality Assurance Report Card” trumpeting the cleanliness of its labs, even as internal tests showed widespread contamination.
Charts sent to customers and obtained by the Globe show that in the first half of 2012, there were no instances of contamination exceeding the accepted standard on surfaces in the “clean rooms,” where the company produced sterile injectable medications such as the steroid now linked to 28 deaths.
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“If you have a nice glossy brochure, and you represent that you can fill a need with all the drug shortages, nobody really wants to ask the hard questions,” he said. “You are led to believe by these vendors they are legitimate, but it’s not really independently vetted out.” I believe in some countries the actions of responsibility here would, at the very least, send those responsible to jail, or worse, result in executions. *We* are responsible for this because we allowed it. Think not? What will be done to those responsible here? We'll fine millionaires tens of thousands of dollars? Such an amount was likely part of their business plan and allocated. People were being infected and these folks laughed as they handed out brochures that were all BUT truthful. There are places in hell for people like this, and we need to create them right now up here for these folks.
I agree. The people responsible should, at the least, be charged with manslaughter. Ignoring the test results was a deliberate act with full knowledge of possible consequences.
With this many bodies, somebody needs to lose their freedom -- at least several years for each death.