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Neon Tommy - Annenberg digital news

Company Tied To Meningitis Outbreak Broke Regulations

Cara Palmer |
October 13, 2012 | 11:23 a.m. PDT

Executive Producer

The meningitis outbreak continues. (Sanofi Pasteur, Creative Commons)
The meningitis outbreak continues. (Sanofi Pasteur, Creative Commons)
The New England Compounding Center, a drug company involved in the deadly outbreak of meningitis in the U.S., sold drugs without requiring prescriptions from physicians, despite Massachusetts state law requiring individual patient prescriptions.

The company had sold thousands of vials containing a steroid contaminated by a fungus, vials that have been used to give people pain-relieving shots. The distribution of these shots has already resulted in the deaths of 14 people and put thousands more at risk for meningitis.

One woman who received a shot from one of these contaminated vials is now suing the New England Compounding Pharmacy, Inc.

 

Read more of Neon Tommy's coverage of the meningitis outbreak here.

Reach Executive Producer Cara Palmer here; follow her here.



 

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