The Japanese company Kobayashi Pharmaceutical announced this Friday that it was examining the cases of 76 additional deaths potentially linked to its anti-cholesterol food supplements containing red yeast rice, a resounding health scandal in the country for several months.
During a previous update on this matter in April, Kobayashi Pharmaceutical reported five deaths potentially linked to its products, which have since been withdrawn from the market. This initial number has since been reduced to four. This therefore brings the provisional total of suspicious deaths in this case to 80.
A first report on January 15
The company only communicated on the subject after mid-March by announcing the recall of three product ranges, although it had received a first worrying report from a doctor on January 15. At the end of March, the company said it had identified puberulic acid, a toxic substance naturally produced by mold, in batches of its recalled products.
Many people who had consumed these food supplements, which appeared to cause kidney problems, were also hospitalized. “Even if the direct cause of hospitalization or death is not kidney disease”, it has “become clear” that in certain cases, the consumption of the products in question has “indirectly” had harmful repercussions on the condition health of people, according to a press release from Kobayashi Pharmaceutical.
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But the company and Japanese health authorities are still working to understand precisely why and how this massive health scandal occurred.
