Lebanese children with cancer suffer a path full of pains and fears

On October 29, four kids were hospitalized for chemotherapy before their body temperatures drastically increased. The immunosuppressant medication methotrexate, injected into veins, was cultured, along with a blood culture.

Thus, the same bacteria were discovered in both cultures, leading the doctors to conclude that this medicine was the source of the bacterium and informing the Health Ministry.

The medical staff affirmed that the medicine was provided by the family rather than the hospital and is from India, indicating that the medicine registered with the Health Ministry is from Europe.

Consequently, LBCI attempted to communicate with the families via the hospital to find out the seller of the medicine, but this was unsuccessful due to the confidentiality of the patient's file.

This humanitarian catastrophe opens the door again to the crisis of lack of medicine, which pushes patients to turn to unreliable sources.

Thus, LBCI team got in touch with the pharmaceutical agent, who confirmed that there was enough stock to meet demand in 2022 and that it had been distributed to pharmacies and hospitals. But, this raises several concerns about the fairness of drug distribution and the emergence of a black market.

Moreover, doctors worry that the quality of medical treatments may deteriorate as more drugs flood the market and the state cannot control medicine smuggling. 

Therefore, creating a central laboratory to oversee medicine's safety and quality remains the sole viable solution unless the intention is to flood the market with pharmaceuticals that have no therapeutic need or are even harmful, to feed the black market and medicine cartels.