BPOM Dalami Penemuan EG Dan DEG Lebih Ambang Batas Di Beberapa Produk

Head of BPOM Penny K. Lukito (center) and Professor of ITB Pharmacy School Rahmana Emran Kartasasmita (right) at a press conference in Jakarta/ANTARA

JAKARTA - Head of the Food and Drug Supervisory Agency (BPOM) Penny K. Lukito said that his party would explore the findings of ethylene glycol (EG) and dietilen glycol (DEG) contamination exceeding the threshold in several sirop medicinal products. "The question is whether it is possible because the raw materials change and so on. That will be our deepening stage about why until now there is a level of concentration of pollutants reaching products that exceed the threshold," said Head of BPOM Penny in a press conference in Jakarta, Antara, Sunday, October 23. Previously, BPOM had tested 102 sirop drugs that were included in the list of Health Ministries used by patients with progressive acute kidney disorders (acute kidney injury/AKI). From the test, it was found that three products contained EG/DEG contamination exceeded the safe threshold. The three products are included in the five products previously announced by BPOM on October 20, 2022. According to the recognized Farmakope and national standard, the safe threshold or Tolerable Daily Intake (TDI) for EG and DEG contamination is 0.5 mg/kg of weight per day. "This will be our deepening of the companies whose products have exceeded the threshold," explained Penny. In the same press conference, Professor of the Pharmacy School of the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB) Rahmana Emran Kartasasmita said the findings of contamination exceeding the threshold did not mean that the conclusion was related to kidney disorders that occurred in children. "That needs to be understood, it does not at all state the relationship of causality," he explained. In the risk study, he said, if a value exceeds the security threshold, it is not interpreted that there will be poisoning but creates a risk to those who consume it. "Don't then draw a very reckless conclusion that there is a causality relationship. Not at all," said Rahmana.