Buenos Aires, February 27 (NA) – A Federal Police officer in charge of securing the premises of HLB Pharma, implicated in the fentanyl adulteration case, was detained for a supposed theft committed at the company's facilities. Case sources informed the Argentine News Agency that the officer allegedly stole a box of latex gloves, containers of hydrogen peroxide, and disinfectants, and then hid them in his car. In this context, a municipal police officer from San Isidro filed a complaint with the Federal Court No. 1 of that judicial department, which ordered the officer's arrest to give a statement and was subsequently released. Ariel García Furfaro, owner of HLB Pharma and Ramallo S.A., is accused of having participated together with 16 members of the staff of both laboratories in “the making of various decisions related to the manufacturing, distribution and sale” in the adulteration of batch 31202 of the opioid, which was “destined for public health use, with a production order issued on December 16, 2024”. “The adulterations of the medicinal substance consisted of its contamination from a manufacturing process characterized by multiple shortcomings, including many critical ones, regarding which there were multiple alerts that were not heeded,” the document accessed by NA states. To date, 111 deaths from the contaminated opioid have been confirmed.
