Minister of Health and Mass Media Dr Nalinda Jayatissa\u00a0has\u00a0sent a letter of demand for\u00a0Rs. 1 billion in damages from YouTube content creator Dharmasri Kariyawasam, accusing him of disseminating false and defamatory material linking the Minister to the importation of Ondansetron and inciting public unrest.<\/p>\n
The notice, sent through the Minister\u2019s\u00a0lawyers,\u00a0states that investigations are currently under way into 10 medicines, including Ondansetron Injection, manufactured by India-based Maan Pharmaceutical Limited.<\/p>\n
Ondansetron Injection was among nine injectable drugs recently suspended by the National Medicines Regulatory Authority (NMRA) following reports of patients\u00a0administered\u00a0with the drug suffering\u00a0adverse complications.<\/p>\n
Despite the ongoing investigations, Kariyawasam allegedly aired a widely viewed programme on his YouTube channel titled \u201cThe hidden story of the Indian drug that claimed lives, Mayor Balthazaar\u2019s relative, and Minister Nalinda\u2019s cover-up.\u201d<\/p>\n
According\u00a0to the letter of demand, the programme falsely portrayed Minister Jayatissa as being directly responsible for importing the drug, colluding with the supplier, and attempting to conceal the issue, while depicting him as indifferent to public suffering.<\/p>\n
The Minister\u2019s lawyers maintain that these allegations are entirely false and defamatory, citing passages in which Kariyawasam allegedly accused Jayatissa of lying about the supplier, concealing facts related to PTC Medicals (Pvt) Ltd., the actual importer, and showing a lack of concern over deaths purportedly linked to the drug.<\/p>\n
The programme also claimed links between the directors of PTC Medicals and family members of Colombo Mayor Vra\u00eee Cally Balthazaar, implying political favouritism.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Minister of Health and Mass Media Dr Nalinda Jayatissa\u00a0has\u00a0sent a letter of demand for\u00a0Rs. 1 billion in damages…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":672205,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4315],"tags":[105,4326,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-672204","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-medication","8":"tag-health","9":"tag-medication","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115833943316345641","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/672204","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=672204"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/672204\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/672205"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=672204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=672204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=672204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}