The death toll continues to climb in conjunction with a meningitis outbreak stemming from contaminated steroid injections distributed by the New England Compounding Center.
The CDC is now reporting that 19 fatalities are likely the result of a meningitis infection caused by a steroid injection contaminated with mold, with Tennessee seeing the most tragedy with eight deaths in that state alone. Florida and Virginia have now also joined the ranks of those states that have recorded a patient fatality.
245 cases have been reported in total so far, but that doesn’t even begin to encompass the number of people that might be at risk of incurring an infection. These items, which were available all the way back in May, may not lead to symptom manifestation for weeks or months, and authorities are doing whatever they can to get in contact with the 14,000 people believed to possibly be in danger.
United States facilities are currently in the process of checking their records against the 131,000 invoices for NECC products that the Food and Drug Administration made available to such facilities. To further get to the heart of the matter, a raid was conducted by FDA agents at the Framingham, Massachusetts facility of NECC. A criminal investigation might be forthcoming, and the fact that the FDA cited the company for violations as far back as 2006 has the House of Representatives asking the safety organization to give them all documents pertaining to the compounding center.