by Debbie Cenziper and Megan Rose, ProPublica, and Melissa Dai, Medill Investigative Lab

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Lawmakers at the helm of the Senate Special Committee on Aging have proposed a sweeping series of changes that could transform the way the government safeguards the quality of essential generic drugs.

Citing a recent ProPublica investigation, the senators said the Food and Drug Administration should alert hospitals and other group purchasers when foreign drugmakers with serious safety and quality failures are given a special pass to send their products to the United States.

Since 2013, ProPublica found, the FDA quietly allowed more than 20 troubled overseas factories, mostly in India, to continue to send certain medications here even after those facilities were banned because of concerns about contamination and other breaches. The agency didn’t........

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