Vital drug supplies restored

THE production of vital chemotherapy drugs has resumed after 65 cancer patients had their treatment delayed for up to a week.

Baxter Healthcare, which was unable to produce commercial supplies of compounded chemotherapy for two weeks due to manufacturing difficulties, said it has restarted production of the drugs.

Hospitals were forced to postpone or delay treatment for patients due to the shortage of drugs. A spokeswoman said it is “working closely with customers to fulfil all the orders we have in our system for this week and are accepting orders for next week”.

She added: “In addition, we have some product arriving into Dublin from our UK network which will be available to customers by Tuesday.”

Asked how it intended to reduce the risks of serious shortages in the future, she said it plans to install an additional chemotherapy compounding machine in its Dublin facility “this summer”. This will provide for a contingency and additional capacity.

Baxter provides approximately 15pc of Ireland’s compounded chemotherapy for patients and the remainder is made in-house by hospitals. The HSE said it intends to conduct a needs assessment for local compounding requirements in hospitals.

Meanwhile, the Roche pharmaceutical company said it has written to hospitals and doctors to say that, in addition to their intravenous form, it can provide two oncology medicines – Mabthera (rituximab) and Herceptin (trastuzumab) – in injectable form.