The chief executive officer of AM2PAT, Inc., has fled the United States after two managers from his company’s North Carolina plant were sentenced to several years in prison for shipping medical syringes that were not sterilized, as required by law.  Five people have died and hundreds became sick after using the bacteria-tainted syringes which were not sterilized because the company wanted to save money.

US authorities believe Dushyant Patel has returned to his homeland, India, to evade arrest after he was indicted on 10 charges that include false statements, fraud, and selling adulterated medical devices.  The indictments came last week and an international manhunt was launched when Patel could not be found in the Chicago area, where AM2PAT is headquartered.

US Attorney George Holding has vowed to find Patel, saying, “We’re putting all resources available to bringing him back here.”

Recently, Aniruddha Patel and Ravindra Kumar Sharma were sentenced to 4-1/2 years in prison each following convictions of fraud and for allowing tainted drugs to be released into the marketplace.  Patel was manager of the company’s plant in Angier, North Carolina, where the tainted syringes were manufactured, and Sharma was its quality control director.  Both men pleaded guilty and released details of plant operations to federal prosecutors.

To cut costs, the company bypassed sterilization procedures, failed to follow regulations governing sterilization, and falsified manufacture dates so the syringes would appear to have been sterilized.  About a year ago, Patel, the company owner, told federal authorities investigating the bacterial infection outbreak that all syringes implicated in the investigation had been recalled and destroyed.

The tainted syringes were sold for almost $7 million in 2006 and 2007.  They contained either the blood-thinning drug, heparin, or a saline solution, both of which are used to flush intravenous lines for patients receiving cancer treatments, kidney dialysis, and several other procedures.

Because the patients exposed to the tainted syringes were already fighting life-threatening medical conditions, it has been difficult to determine exactly how many patients were sickened by the tainted syringes.  Authorities say between 200 and 300 patients have become sick with bacterial infections in Colorado, Florida, Illinois, and Texas, and five deaths have been linked conclusively to the syringes.  In some cases, patients developed spinal meningitis and permanent brain damage.