The Panama medicine deaths have reflected managerial differences between different countries, a senior official with China's drug watchdog said in Beijing on Monday.

"Management on imported drugs varies among different countries, " said Wu Zhen, State Food and Drug Administration (SFDA) deputy director, at a press conference.

"This will inevitably result in blank points in management that may enable some companies to take advantage of the loophole," he said.

China has been strict with management on chemical medical materials, said Wu.

According to China's law on drug management, Chinese companies are not allowed to produce medical materials which could be directly used in medicine unless they have got a licence and a certificate number from relevant drug authority.

And China has set down specific regulations on imported drug management, Wu said, noting that no drug will be admitted into the country before it is proved to be safe.

In some countries, however, imported drugs need not be approved, the official said.

To address the differences, Wu said the SFDA has signed an agreement with relevant organizations of the European Union on strengthening drug management, and has reached consensus with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) of the United States in areas of drug and medical apparatus safety.

China's actions follow the deaths of dozens of people in Panama after taking medicine that was made in China. A Chinese company shipped 11,349 kg of "TD glycerin" to Spain in 2003, where it was then sold on to Panama.

The product, "TD glycerin," an industrial solvent containing the toxic diethylene glycol, were later found to be linked to dozens of deaths in Panama from tainted medicine.

Chinese quality officials have said "TD glycerin" is a misleading label because it could be mistaken for glycerin, a sweetener commonly used in drugs. China has shut down the Taixing Glycerin Factory, the producer of "TD glycerin."

But Chinese quality officials stressed that the Panamanian merchants are mainly responsible for the tragedy because they changed the scope of use and shelf-life of this product.

The Chinese company confirmed with the Spanish company that the product could not be used in pharmaceuticals in China and that its shelf-life was one year instead of four years, according to Chinese officials.

At the press conference, Wu also warned both domestic and foreign drug trading companies not to import from illegal Chinese exporters or drug producers to ensure drug safety.

(Xinhua News Agency December 4, 2007)