This Monday, through a resolution signed by the Minister of Health, Mario Lugonespublished in the Official Gazette, the limitation of transitory designation and its departure from the official was formalized Mariela Garcíarequested by ANMAT itself through file IF-2025-89047132. The measure was immediately effective and no internal replacement or transfer was mentioned.
Amid the judicial investigation for the distribution of contaminated fentanyl, which already caused more than ninety confirmed deaths and caused strong questions about the effectiveness of state controls, Minister Lugones admitted delays in the detection of irregularities. For this reason, Garcia’s detachment is not accidental, although the national government did not officially relate its departure to the case.
Since October 2019, Garcia held the position of Director of Post Marketing Surveillance and Regulatory Actions of the National Institute of Medical Products (INPM), a strategic area within the ANMAT dedicated to early detecting health risks in medicines and devices in circulation.
But García’s career in the Anmat began in the early 2000s “without having the necessary expertise for the area,” government sources detail: the displaced is speech therapist. A no less detail for the position of relevant technical weight in the regulatory body that is responsible for certifying that medical products in use are safe and reliable.
“Fentanyl ampoules contamination is the worst medicine poisoning situation in the country’s history since the creation of the ANMAT,” said the deputy Pablo Yedlinformer Minister of Health of Tucuman. With almost one hundred dead by contaminated fentanyl, the scandal presented the vulnerability of health control systems in Argentina.
Justice verified that there were at least two lots of this medicine that presented bacterial contamination within the tramples of the soothing. The most detailed biochemical analysis verified the presence of two types of microorganisms: Klebsiella Pneumoniae and Ralstonia spp.
At this point of the investigation carried out by the judge Ernesto Kreplakfrom the court it is estimated that there were around 154 thousand contaminated ampoules. Of those, 28% were administered to patients and, in recent days, it could be kidnapped and recovered all of the remaining ones, so, in theory, there are no longer dangerous blisters in the deposits of the Health Institutes.
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