6 jailed for producing lethal paracetamol syrup in 1992

A court in Bangladesh capital Dhaka has sentenced six persons including owner of a pharmaceuticals company to 10 years in jail for producing lethal paracetamol.

Drug Court Judge M Atoar Rahman on Monday also awarded Shahjahan Sarker, a director of now-defunct BCI (Bangladesh), and its five absconding officials 200,000 taka (about 2,564 U.S. dollars) fine each in the two cases of 1992.

The company was among the five pharmaceuticals tested positive for using lethal and cheap chemical diethylene glycol in their paracetamol syrups which left 76 children dead in 1992.

Toxic chemical and diethylene glycol have been detected in paracetamol syrup manufactured by five companies including BCI, which was suspected to have killed as many as 2,700 children from 1982 to 1992 in Bangladesh.

Sources said a chemical, normally used in the textile and leather dying industries, was used in the preparation of the paracetamol product as a deadly alternative to propylene glycol.