Clipping Board » Drug Poisoning ─ It is necessary to be aware of the toxic side effects before taking medication.
Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. was actually boiling donkey-hide gelatin in a women's bathhouse, and the raw materials were expired drugs. The despicable behavior of Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. is outrageous. The donkey-hide gelatin longevity oral liquid, children's fever-reducing oral liquid, Yupingfeng oral liquid, and children's cough and asthma oral liquid produced by Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. must be carefully identified.
Disgusting
The ground was covered with black gelatin blocks, eggs, and eggshells; the water from the showerhead was used to boil the donkey-hide gelatin.
Appalling
Employees wore casual clothes and sandals to enter and exit the workshop; they tore off the outer packaging of expired drugs such as "Donkey-hide Gelatin Longevity Oral Liquid" and poured the drugs into a bucket for filtering and filling.
The blood-tonifying donkey-hide gelatin, if it is directly boiled with water from a showerhead in a women's bathhouse, would you dare to take such donkey-hide gelatin? The bottles of expired drugs that have been repackaged and put back on the market, how can they not make people break out in a cold sweat!
After several investigations and interviews, reporters found that the pharmaceutical process of Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd., which claims to have "built a comprehensive preparation workshop according to national standards," is shocking.
(Donkey-hide gelatin oral liquid boiled in a bathhouse, photographed by reporter Lu Jing)
Angry tip-off
"Taking such medicine can be fatal."
On July 14, a reader tipped off our newspaper that Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd., located in Mazhao, Zhouzhi County, set up a steam pot in the women's bathhouse to produce "Donkey-hide Gelatin Longevity Oral Liquid," and repackaged and sold expired "Children's Fever-Reducing Oral Liquid," "Yupingfeng Oral Liquid," and other approved drugs.
"Repackaging and selling expired drugs is too unethical. When a child has a fever in the middle of the night, it can drive parents crazy. If the child is given expired drugs, it can be fatal," said an insider, furious about the practices of Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. The insider said that because the practices of Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. are too deceitful, they were willing to speak out about it.
(Workers open the expired oral liquid and pour it into a bucket for centralized collection, photographed by reporter Lu Jing)
Witnessing chaos
Chaos 1
Donkey-hide gelatin boiling in a pot next to a dripping mop
According to the whistleblower, the security system at Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. is strict, and strangers are hard to enter, with several cameras installed around the factory area. The reporter visited the company three times for investigation.
Recently, after several days of observation, the reporter took advantage of the security guard's absence to enter the company and went straight to the women's bathhouse connected to the restroom.
Arriving at the door of the women's bathhouse, a foul smell hit. Pushing open the old wooden door, a surge of steam rushed out. As the steam gradually dispersed, the changing room floor was seen covered with black gelatin blocks, eggs, and eggshells. Inside the bathhouse, a showerhead was still running water, and the exhaust fan above the showerhead was spinning non-stop. In the center of the bathhouse, a boiling steam pot was emitting a foul smell from the bubbling donkey-hide gelatin, and a female worker was adding eggs to the gelatin. The water used to boil the donkey-hide gelatin was directly from the bathhouse showerhead. Next to this steam pot, there was also a dripping mop.
(Workers visually inspect canned bottles for impurities)
It is understood that female employees still use this bathhouse after regular working hours. A company leader stated that donkey-hide gelatin is similar to the glue used by carpenters in the past. Due to its unpleasant odor, it is initially processed in the women's bathhouse. Subsequently, other medications are added for further processing before being bottled and shipped.
Chaos 2
Rudimentary Sanitary Ware Disinfection Room with Workers in Casual Clothes and Sandals
After leaving the women's bathhouse, the reporter arrived at the production workshop of Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. Upon entering, no disinfection facilities were found in this pharmaceutical enterprise. The empty sanitary ware disinfection room was cluttered with a few mops, a water faucet, and a sink.
Inside the production workshop, female workers were all dressed in casual clothes and sandals, lacking the necessary masks and caps for a pharmaceutical production environment. Employees could directly enter the production area, where cardboard boxes and medications were scattered everywhere.
(Labeling the canned bottles)
Chaos 3
Removing Expired Drug Packaging, Filtering the Liquid, and Rebottling
In a room less than 20 square meters within the production workshop, several female workers sat around a white plastic bucket surrounded by medications. These included "Pediatric Antipyretic Oral Solution" produced on May 14, 2005, with a two-year validity period; "Yupingfeng Oral Solution" produced in October 2005, valid until September 2007; "Donkey-Hide Gelatin Longevity Oral Solution" produced on May 28, 2006, with an 18-month validity period; and "Pediatric Cough and Asthma Oral Solution" produced on December 2, 2005, valid until November 2007. These oral solutions, stripped of their outer packaging, were placed in large cardboard boxes.
Several female workers skillfully used pliers to remove the yellow caps from expired oral solutions soaked in water and poured the medication into a white plastic bucket. Through the reporter's investigation, it was discovered that after approximately 10,000 units of each oral solution were disassembled, the workshop management would arrange for the expired medication in the white plastic bucket to be filtered using a filtration device.
Chaos 4
Magnifying Glass and a Lamp: The Sole Quality Inspection Tools
Upon entering the quality inspection room, the reporter found several women arranging medicine bottles on a conveyor belt. The quality inspection process involved passing all bottles under a red lamp on the conveyor belt, with one woman using a magnifying glass to inspect each bottle as it rolled by.
According to an insider, recycled bottles with damage from unpacking are no longer used. The rebottled expired medication must undergo this inspection process to ensure that no label fragments or glass shards from the disassembly remain. If the filtration is not thorough and consumers discover these issues, "it would be a major problem."
After quality inspection, the brown medicine bottles rolled along the conveyor belt as the machine operated. Fresh labels were affixed to the new bottles, with the production date marked as July 2008.Severe Consequences
(The finished oral solution, canned and packaged, will be transported to various locations)
Medicines Sold Nationwide
On the website of Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd., the company states: "Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. is a pharmaceutical enterprise integrating research, production, and sales. The comprehensive preparation workshop, built according to national standards, has five production lines fully certified by GMP. It also owns a 300-acre GAP Chinese herbal medicine planting base. Currently, it can produce 41 varieties across eight dosage forms, including tablets, hard capsules, soft capsules, granules, mixtures, syrups, oral solutions, and eye drops."
During the investigation, reporters obtained a material card from Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. dated June 12, 2008. The card indicates that on that day alone, the production quantity of "Ejiao Yishou Oral Solution" reached 23,000 bottles. According to insiders, the company ships between 1,100 and 1,400 boxes of various oral solutions each month, with medicines sold nationwide and monthly revenues exceeding one million yuan.
Regulatory Crackdown
Production Workshop Sealed
An industry insider explained that the production environment for medicines requires very high standards. Employees must wear work uniforms, undergo disinfection before entering the production area, and caps and masks are essential equipment for frontline workers. Additionally, the water used in processing must be purified. However, the production operation room of Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. lacks disinfection facilities, and employees enter and exit at will without wearing work uniforms, clearly not meeting the requirements for pharmaceutical production.
Yesterday morning, after receiving reports from journalists about Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. recycling expired medicines, the leadership of the Zhouzhi County Drug Administration immediately dispatched Huang Zhengliang, head of the inspection department, and other law enforcement officers to the company. In the operation room, they found female workers unsealing expired medicines and pouring them into plastic buckets, while others were labeling them.
Huang Zhengliang asked a supervisor surnamed Liu, "Where is the women's bathhouse?" The supervisor pointed to the bathhouse that reporters had investigated a few days earlier. When law enforcement officers entered the women's bathhouse, they found the steam boiler still placed in the center of the bathhouse, though it was not in operation. Upon seeing this, the drug administration personnel immediately sealed the production site on the spot and questioned the staff. After reviewing the approval numbers of several medicines, including "Ejiao Yishou Oral Solution" and "Weiling Mixture," Huang Zhengliang clearly pointed out that these approval numbers no longer existed. This article was written by reporter Jing Ji.
Source: http://y. china. com. cn/ faxianView/ 839
Shocking: Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. Boils Ejiao in Women's Bathhouse
Disgusting
The ground was covered with black gelatin blocks, eggs, and eggshells; the water from the showerhead was used to boil the donkey-hide gelatin.
Appalling
Employees wore casual clothes and sandals to enter and exit the workshop; they tore off the outer packaging of expired drugs such as "Donkey-hide Gelatin Longevity Oral Liquid" and poured the drugs into a bucket for filtering and filling.
The blood-tonifying donkey-hide gelatin, if it is directly boiled with water from a showerhead in a women's bathhouse, would you dare to take such donkey-hide gelatin? The bottles of expired drugs that have been repackaged and put back on the market, how can they not make people break out in a cold sweat!
After several investigations and interviews, reporters found that the pharmaceutical process of Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd., which claims to have "built a comprehensive preparation workshop according to national standards," is shocking.
(Donkey-hide gelatin oral liquid boiled in a bathhouse, photographed by reporter Lu Jing)
Angry tip-off
"Taking such medicine can be fatal."
On July 14, a reader tipped off our newspaper that Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd., located in Mazhao, Zhouzhi County, set up a steam pot in the women's bathhouse to produce "Donkey-hide Gelatin Longevity Oral Liquid," and repackaged and sold expired "Children's Fever-Reducing Oral Liquid," "Yupingfeng Oral Liquid," and other approved drugs.
"Repackaging and selling expired drugs is too unethical. When a child has a fever in the middle of the night, it can drive parents crazy. If the child is given expired drugs, it can be fatal," said an insider, furious about the practices of Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. The insider said that because the practices of Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. are too deceitful, they were willing to speak out about it.
(Workers open the expired oral liquid and pour it into a bucket for centralized collection, photographed by reporter Lu Jing)
Witnessing chaos
Chaos 1
Donkey-hide gelatin boiling in a pot next to a dripping mop
According to the whistleblower, the security system at Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. is strict, and strangers are hard to enter, with several cameras installed around the factory area. The reporter visited the company three times for investigation.
Recently, after several days of observation, the reporter took advantage of the security guard's absence to enter the company and went straight to the women's bathhouse connected to the restroom.
Arriving at the door of the women's bathhouse, a foul smell hit. Pushing open the old wooden door, a surge of steam rushed out. As the steam gradually dispersed, the changing room floor was seen covered with black gelatin blocks, eggs, and eggshells. Inside the bathhouse, a showerhead was still running water, and the exhaust fan above the showerhead was spinning non-stop. In the center of the bathhouse, a boiling steam pot was emitting a foul smell from the bubbling donkey-hide gelatin, and a female worker was adding eggs to the gelatin. The water used to boil the donkey-hide gelatin was directly from the bathhouse showerhead. Next to this steam pot, there was also a dripping mop.
(Workers visually inspect canned bottles for impurities)
It is understood that female employees still use this bathhouse after regular working hours. A company leader stated that donkey-hide gelatin is similar to the glue used by carpenters in the past. Due to its unpleasant odor, it is initially processed in the women's bathhouse. Subsequently, other medications are added for further processing before being bottled and shipped.
Chaos 2
Rudimentary Sanitary Ware Disinfection Room with Workers in Casual Clothes and Sandals
After leaving the women's bathhouse, the reporter arrived at the production workshop of Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. Upon entering, no disinfection facilities were found in this pharmaceutical enterprise. The empty sanitary ware disinfection room was cluttered with a few mops, a water faucet, and a sink.
Inside the production workshop, female workers were all dressed in casual clothes and sandals, lacking the necessary masks and caps for a pharmaceutical production environment. Employees could directly enter the production area, where cardboard boxes and medications were scattered everywhere.
(Labeling the canned bottles)
Chaos 3
Removing Expired Drug Packaging, Filtering the Liquid, and Rebottling
In a room less than 20 square meters within the production workshop, several female workers sat around a white plastic bucket surrounded by medications. These included "Pediatric Antipyretic Oral Solution" produced on May 14, 2005, with a two-year validity period; "Yupingfeng Oral Solution" produced in October 2005, valid until September 2007; "Donkey-Hide Gelatin Longevity Oral Solution" produced on May 28, 2006, with an 18-month validity period; and "Pediatric Cough and Asthma Oral Solution" produced on December 2, 2005, valid until November 2007. These oral solutions, stripped of their outer packaging, were placed in large cardboard boxes.
Several female workers skillfully used pliers to remove the yellow caps from expired oral solutions soaked in water and poured the medication into a white plastic bucket. Through the reporter's investigation, it was discovered that after approximately 10,000 units of each oral solution were disassembled, the workshop management would arrange for the expired medication in the white plastic bucket to be filtered using a filtration device.
Chaos 4
Magnifying Glass and a Lamp: The Sole Quality Inspection Tools
Upon entering the quality inspection room, the reporter found several women arranging medicine bottles on a conveyor belt. The quality inspection process involved passing all bottles under a red lamp on the conveyor belt, with one woman using a magnifying glass to inspect each bottle as it rolled by.
According to an insider, recycled bottles with damage from unpacking are no longer used. The rebottled expired medication must undergo this inspection process to ensure that no label fragments or glass shards from the disassembly remain. If the filtration is not thorough and consumers discover these issues, "it would be a major problem."
After quality inspection, the brown medicine bottles rolled along the conveyor belt as the machine operated. Fresh labels were affixed to the new bottles, with the production date marked as July 2008.Severe Consequences
(The finished oral solution, canned and packaged, will be transported to various locations)
Medicines Sold Nationwide
On the website of Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd., the company states: "Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. is a pharmaceutical enterprise integrating research, production, and sales. The comprehensive preparation workshop, built according to national standards, has five production lines fully certified by GMP. It also owns a 300-acre GAP Chinese herbal medicine planting base. Currently, it can produce 41 varieties across eight dosage forms, including tablets, hard capsules, soft capsules, granules, mixtures, syrups, oral solutions, and eye drops."
During the investigation, reporters obtained a material card from Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. dated June 12, 2008. The card indicates that on that day alone, the production quantity of "Ejiao Yishou Oral Solution" reached 23,000 bottles. According to insiders, the company ships between 1,100 and 1,400 boxes of various oral solutions each month, with medicines sold nationwide and monthly revenues exceeding one million yuan.
Regulatory Crackdown
Production Workshop Sealed
An industry insider explained that the production environment for medicines requires very high standards. Employees must wear work uniforms, undergo disinfection before entering the production area, and caps and masks are essential equipment for frontline workers. Additionally, the water used in processing must be purified. However, the production operation room of Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. lacks disinfection facilities, and employees enter and exit at will without wearing work uniforms, clearly not meeting the requirements for pharmaceutical production.
Yesterday morning, after receiving reports from journalists about Xi'an Meichen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. recycling expired medicines, the leadership of the Zhouzhi County Drug Administration immediately dispatched Huang Zhengliang, head of the inspection department, and other law enforcement officers to the company. In the operation room, they found female workers unsealing expired medicines and pouring them into plastic buckets, while others were labeling them.
Huang Zhengliang asked a supervisor surnamed Liu, "Where is the women's bathhouse?" The supervisor pointed to the bathhouse that reporters had investigated a few days earlier. When law enforcement officers entered the women's bathhouse, they found the steam boiler still placed in the center of the bathhouse, though it was not in operation. Upon seeing this, the drug administration personnel immediately sealed the production site on the spot and questioned the staff. After reviewing the approval numbers of several medicines, including "Ejiao Yishou Oral Solution" and "Weiling Mixture," Huang Zhengliang clearly pointed out that these approval numbers no longer existed. This article was written by reporter Jing Ji.
Source: http://y. china. com. cn/ faxianView/ 839