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Oct. 17 (NBD) -- Chinese drug safety authorities on Tuesday slapped a whopping 9.1-billion-yuan (1.3-billion-U.S. dollar) penalty on Changchun Changsheng after the vaccine maker was embroiled in a scandal over fabricating production records of rabies vaccines for human use.

The State Drug Administration (SDA) and the Jilin Food and Drug Administration confiscated illegal income of 1.89 billion yuan from and imposed a fine of 7.21 billion yuan on the vaccine maker. 

The vaccine scandal of Changchun Changsheng, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Shenzhen-listed Changsheng Bio-tech Co Ltd (Changsheng Bio-tech), has raised concerns and ignited anger of the public.

Li Jiang, a legal adviser to the SDA, held that Changchun Changsheng's production of defective rabies vaccines is an organized, long-time, harmful and illegal conduct as well as an extremely shocking and rare illegal case in the drug safety domain. The penalty decision could sound a warning in the pharmaceutical circle and demonstrate the authorities' determination to safeguard public health, Li added.

A compensation plan for the victims of the vaccine incident was also unveiled. Families of those who died from the injection of problematic vaccine will receive a one-off compensation of 650,000 yuan (94,062.5 U.S. dollars) for each victim, and each victim who became paralyzed or severely disabled and each victim who became mildly disabled due to the defective vaccines will receive 500,000 yuan (72,355.8 U.S. dollars) and 200,000 yuan (28,942.3 U.S. dollars) for compensation, respectively, according to the plan.

Moreover, the provincial food and drug administration of Jilin revoked the Drug Manufacturing Certificate of Changchun Changsheng. And executives and other related persons held responsible were banned from engaging in drug production and marketing activities.

On the same day, the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) announced a fine of 600,000 yuan (86,826.9 U.S. dollars) on Changsheng Bio-tech in a separate statement. In addition, the CSRC decided to impose a fine of 300,000 yuan (43,413.5 U.S. dollars) each on four of the company's executives bearing direct responsibility and banned them from the securities market for life.

 

Email: gaohan@nbd.com.cn

Editor: Gao Han