Victims of the mass poisoning in Panama denounce their lives were "ruined"

Panama City, April 29 (EFE).– Narciso Cosme Aguilar, known as "The Science Teacher," no longer recites the décimas of the mejorana song, a traditional Panamanian folk expression. He forgets the verses, and he can't write them down either, due to the stiffness in his fingers, the result of ingesting a poisoned cough syrup 21 years ago, given to him by the social security system.

Aguilar, a father of nine, was 45 years old and working in building maintenance when he caught a cold in 2005 and went to a Social Security (CSS) clinic in the capital. There, a doctor prescribed him a cough syrup made by the institution containing diethylene glycol, an industrial refrigerant.

In total, Aguilar took one and a half bottles of the poisoned syrup, until he decided to stop taking it because of the symptoms it caused, which would only be the beginning of an ordeal that continues.

Aguilar is one of the thousands of victims—including at least 800 deaths according to activists—of the diethylene glycol poisoning that struck Panama between 2004 and 2006, one of the worst tragedies of its kind in the world. The disaster exposed an international and local supply chain riddled with counterfeiting and negligence, as the UN and the World Health Organization (WHO) stated in a July 2025 report.

The neurological deterioration and body aches that Aguilar has are also suffered by Omayra Tristán, now 63, who ingested the poisoned syrup when she had a cold in 2006.

"They ruined our lives, our families, our entire world," says Ms. Tristán, who says she is startled every day, fearing she could die at any moment.

CAMERA: CARLOS LEMOS

FOOTAGE OF NARCISO COSME AGUILAR AND OMAYRA TRISTÁN, VICTIMS OF POISONING.