SHANGHAI officials are to closely monitoradversereactions to an anti-diabetes drug following concerns over the risk of heart disease.

The use of Avandia has been significantly restricted in the United States and sales in Europe are being suspended.

Shanghai's Food and Drug Administration said it would be cooperating with local health authorities to watch out for any problems in the city.

It asks GlaxoSmithKline, the drug's producer, to collect and report on any cases of adversereactions in the city.

The US FDA restricts the use of Avandia to patients who can't control their diabetes with any other medicine or to current users who are benefiting from the drug.

Last Thursday, the European Medicines Agency recommended suspension of marketing authorization for Avandia and another two GlaxoSmithKline anti-diabetes drugs - Avandamet and Avaglim - with the same ingredient, rosiglitazone. These medicines will stop being available in Europe within the next few months, the agency said.

Dr Jia Weiping, director of the Shanghai Diabetes Institute, said the moves had aroused the concern of the State Food and Drug Administration, which will meet today to discuss the drug's use and adversereactionsupervision across the country.

"Local patients shouldn't panic about the news of Avandia, since its dosage for Chinese patients is much lower than that for US and European patients," Jia said. "In the West, the drug is prescribed by general physicians while the drug in China is used by specialists after careful consideration of the patient's medical history and is not used for patients with cardiovascular problems."

She said Avandia was a popular diabetes drug in China and there had been no reports of serious side effects so far.

GlaxoSmithKline said it had stopped marketing Avandia in all countries including China after regulators withdrew the product in Europe and restricted its use in the US. The British drug maker had notified China's FDA of the latest situation. It will also release a notice to patients.

"We have not received any adversereaction reports from Chinese patients yet and we suggest patients do not stop taking the medicine before seeking advice from doctors," said a GlaxoSmithKline official.

• monitor [´mɔnitə] n.班长 v.监控；检查 (初中英语单词)
• administration [əd,minis´treiʃən] n.管理(事务等)；经营 (初中英语单词)
• european [juərə´pi:ən] a.欧洲的 n.欧洲人 (初中英语单词)
• agency [´eidʒənsi] n.代理商；机构；代理 (初中英语单词)
• available [ə´veiləbəl] a.可用的；有效的 (初中英语单词)
• director [di´rektə] n.指导者；....长；导演 (初中英语单词)
• institute [´institju:t] n.学院 vt.建立；设置 (初中英语单词)
• reaction [ri´ækʃən] n.反应(力) (初中英语单词)
• consideration [kən,sidə´reiʃən] n.考虑；原因；体谅 (初中英语单词)
• medical [´medikəl] a.医学的；医疗的 (初中英语单词)
• release [ri´li:s] vt&n.释放；放松；赦免 (初中英语单词)
• producer [prə´dju:sə] n.生产者；演出人 (高中英语单词)
• ingredient [in´gri:diənt] n.(混合物的)成分 (高中英语单词)
• supervision [,su:pə´viʒən, ,sju:-] n.管理；监督 (高中英语单词)
• withdrew [wið´dru:] withdraw的过去式 (高中英语单词)
• adverse [´ædvə:s] a.不利的；反对的 (英语四级单词)
• suspension [sə´spenʃən] n.吊；中止；暂停 (英语四级单词)
• taking [´teikiŋ] a.迷人的 n.捕获物 (英语六级单词)