Nigeria’s biggest state is suing the world’s largest drugs company, Pfizer, for allegedly using 200 children as “guinea pigs” in a 1996 drug test which ended in several deaths.

State authorities in Kano last week filed a lawsuit against Pfizer at the high court.

The maker of Viagra and cholesterol-fighter Lipitor, the world’s top-selling medicine, has been accused of secretly using Nigerian children “as guinea pigs to test a drug under the guise of humanitarian gesture”.

They are seeking 2.75 billion dollars in compensation from the company.

The lawsuit dates back to April 1996 when Pfizer and the World Health Organisation offered to help the government of Nigeria tackle an outbreak of cholera, measles and meningitis in Kano in the North of the country.

During the epidemic, in which around 3,000 people died, Pfizer is alleged to have used an experimental antibiotic treatment called Trovanfloxacin on 200 children infected with meningitis, a potentially deadly brain infection.

Eleven of them reportedly died, while several others were said to have suffered a variety of injuries including deafness, paralysis, blindness and brain damage.

Pfizer today denied claims that it lacked proper authority to use the drug.

“The 1996 clinical study was undertaken with the full knowledge of the Nigerian government in a responsible and ethical way consistent with the company’s abiding commitment to patient safety,” the company said in a statement.

“The study helped save the lives of almost 200 children stricken with meningococcal meningitis, a disease that if left untreated, kills four out of every 10 people who contract it. Pfizer always acted in the best interests of the children involved, using the best medical knowledge available.”

At the time, Pfizer was developing Trovan for launch in the US. America’s Food and Drug Administration never approved it for use in children.

A 2001 legal action in the US against Pfizer collapsed after a judge said American courts lacked jurisdiction.

A Nigerian government report on the case surfaced recently which accused the company of conducting “an illegal trial of an unregistered drug”.

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