Adult-dose EpiPens are once again in short supply in Canada as manufacturing issues persist at a Pfizer plant that produces them for Mylan.
Pfizer warned Health Canada last week that EpiPen epinephrine auto-injectors in the 0.3-mg and 0.15-mg doses will remain limited through August. It expects the next shipment of EpiPen 0.3 mg to hit the the Canadian market by late August.
It said it can still supply EpiPen Jr for children but supplies of it are limited and the are being “carefully managed across the country.”
There are no alternative auto-injectors available in Canada, according to CTV. EpiPens are used to deliver an emergency shot of epinephrine in case of a life-threatening allergic reaction.
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Pfizer alerted Canadian authorities of low supplies of the auto-injectors four times last year and again in January of this year. Then in April, it reported shortages of both adult and youth versions of the product. Shortages were also reported in Britain at the time.
Supply issues of the pens followed recalls last year of tens of thousands of EpiPen injectors that had been manufactured for Mylan at Pfizer’s Meridian Medical Technologies plant in St. Louis, Missouri. An FDA warning letter was issued to the plant after an inspection found Meridian continued to produce the pens even as consumer and provider complaints mounted that many were failing during emergencies, “including some situations in which patients subsequently died.”