Drugs

Compounding Pharmacy Owner Convicted in 2012 Meningitis Outbreak

A Massachusetts federal court jury has found former New England Compounding Center co-owner Barry Cadden guilty of racketeering and other charges in a 2012 fungal meningitis outbreak that killed more than 60 people and sickened hundreds more nationwide. The Boston Globe reports that the jury returned guilty verdicts on charges of racketeering, racketeering conspiracy, and more than 50 counts of mail fraud. But it rejected charges holding Cadden responsible for 25 of the deaths allegedly caused by contaminated medicine shipped by the pharmacy. The article says that decision could keep Cadden from facing a life sentence for second-degree murder. He also was acquitted of various other charges, including defrauding FDA.

Investigators traced the source of the outbreak to batches of a steroid that had been contaminated with fungus during production at the compounding pharmacy in Framingham, 20 miles west of Boston.

The Globe says that while a majority of jurors sided with prosecutors and voted to find Cadden responsible for 23 of the 25 deaths he was charged with, the lack of a unanimous verdict meant that he was able to avoid those charges. In the remaining two cases, involving people in Florida and North Carolina, the jury unanimously found Cadden not responsible for the deaths.

Authorities charged that Cadden, who also was the company’s chief pharmacist, was so reckless and profit-driven that he skirted industry regulations and ran a shoddy workplace. Testimony during the trial indicated that Cadden should have known that the drugs could be tainted, and that they posed risks of serious illness and even death.

Prosecutors says Cadden had been told that a clean room at the facility was infested with bugs and mice and that oil had spilled on the floor, with tests confirming the existence of mold, but he did nothing. Instead, they said, he proceeded with the dangerous process of compounding sterile drugs, including steroids.

Cadden’s defense argued that the company had distributed more than 859,000 vials of four high-risk steroids without incident since 2006 and said prosecutors had failed to show how the contaminated batches were contaminated, what Cadden did to contaminate them, and how he caused the deaths.

He will be sentenced 6/21.

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Gupta Raises Concerns About Overton’s Independence, Ideology

Overton Confirmation Remains Uncertain After Senate Hearing

FDA Classifies Boston Scientific Imager II Catheter Recall as Class I

FDA Approves Gazyva for Childhood-Onset Idiopathic Nephrotic Syndrome