The director of Italy’s medicines regulatory agency has been suspended along with another top official, as the drug licenses-for-cash scandal surrounding the organization continues to unfold, PharmaTimes writes.

Nello Martini, director of Aifa (the Italian Agency for Pharmaceuticals), has been suspended along with Caterina Gualano, head of medicines registration for the agency. The development follows a two-year investigation in which police found evidence that money had changed hands in return for the falsification of clinical data required for drug licences.

Last month, Pasqualino Rossi, one of Aifa’s most senior reps at the European Medicines Agency, had been arrested along with another Aifa official and five pharma lobbyists. The scandal has engulfed Bayer and Glaxo, and emerged after a routine comparison of a branded med and its generic equivalent, which had undergone fewer tests than officially claimed and that data endorsing the drug had been falsified.

The discovery sparked a major investigation, and licences awarded to around 30 medications, mostly thought to be generic products, are now under suspicion. Some reports suggest that 12 deaths that might be linked to the products are being investigated.

A preliminary report by a Government-appointed panel has suggested there is no evidence that any harm has been done to the public, however. The names of the drugs have not been revealed, despite demands from consumer groups for the government to do so.

Italy’s La Repubblica newspaper earlier this month named Bayer and Glaxo as having links to some of those arrested. A Bayer spokeswoman said: “The investigation does not concern the behaviour of the company, but alleged behaviour that could be traced back to some collaborators whose behaviour the company has no knowledge of.” A Glaxo spokesman said: “The claims are completely untrue.”