CDC Tracked Deadly Outbreak Mold

From Donna Borton


A government expert testified today about the desperate 2012 search to clearly identify the mold that was sickening more and more patients even killing some of them.
Mary Brandt, of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told Michigan District Court Judge Shauna Murphy her aid was enlisted by another CDC scientist who had been assigned to investigate what appeared to be a growing and deadly outbreak of fungal meningitis.
Though the first samples came from Tennessee,soon there were others from Michigan and other states.
Brandt was testifying in a pre-trial hearing for Barry J. Cadden and Glenn Chin, both connected to the Massachusetts drug compounding that was eventually identified as the source of the mold and ultimately the outbreak itself. Cadden was president and part owner of the New England Compounding Center and Chin was a supervising pharmacist in the clean room where the deadly drugs were prepared.
They are both charged with second degree murder in the deaths of 11 Michigan patients injected with methylprednisolone acetate from NECC.
Cadden and Chin, dressed in orange prison jump suits, have been present for this week's hearings. They already are serving federal prison terms for their involvement in the outbreak.
Eventually over 800 patients were sickened and over 100 have died as a result of what federal officials have called the worst outbreak in U.S. history caused by a prescription drug.
Brandt, who currently holds the title of Director of Laboratory Safety, headed CDC's Division of Myotic Diseases at the time of the outbreak.
Under questioning by Assistant Attorney General Denise Hart, Brandt described how her unit began receiving samples from the patients who had been identified as outbreak victims. Though the first three samples came from Tennessee, other samples later arrived from North Carolina and Michigan, indicating much more serious involvement.
She said some of the Michigan sample were different because some of the patients had abscesses in joints injected with the steroids.
Those patients underwent surgery and fluid from the abscesses were sent to Brandt and her colleagues for analysis.
She said eventually the fungus extracted from victims, aspergillus fumigatus, matched up with the fungus found in drugs recovered from NECC in its Framingham, Mass. offices. She said that meningitis caused by fungus is very rare and she and others became increasingly alarmed as it became apparent the outbreak was not limited to Tennessee.
Prosecutors also entered into evidence emails recovered from Cadden's computer when the FDA raided NECC's offices in the Fall of 2012. In one email Cadden states that he had 100 percent control of the company. In another he instructed Chin to hire more monkeys to label drugs being shipped out.
The hearing to determine whether Chin and Cadden will be put on trial for the chargeswill resume for a last day tomorrow (Friday) at 8:30 a.m. Both sides will then submit briefs prior to a ruling by Murphy.