10 posts tagged counterfeit medicine

Experts warn: Consumers who buy from fake online pharmacies may end up with counterfeit medicines that damage their health. A full 75 % of consumers who purchased medicine from fake “online pharmacies” couldn’t distinguish the fake from the real medicines and only learn that their medicines are tainted or substandard when it’s too late. 

France24 investigates the “worldwide ring of counterfeit medications.” According to the video report, e-commerce explosion has accelerated the way counterfeit medicine arrives in Europe. In 2010, the European Commission confiscated 3 million units of fake drugs. But the distribution of counterfeit medicine is not limited to Europe - Pfizer brands alone have been counterfeited in 101 countries. Watch the video to learn more.

Fake drugs: a global overdose by tvnportal

Today, Americans can largely protect themselves by avoiding fake online pharmacies. But drug importation legislation could inadvertently threaten the safety of our medicine supply – and exacerbate the problem of counterfeit medicine – by exposing our protected supply chain to medicines from abroad. 

Sixty-one Chinese citizens were hospitalized in 2011 after a fake cancer treatment they were given at a Shanghai Hospital. Of the 61 hospitalized, 17 required surgery. The Shanghai Ruijin-AmMed Cancer Center that illegally purchased the fake drugs before passing them on to the hospital had its drug sales license revoked. Some of the suspected counterfeiters worked at the cancer center itself.

In early 2006, citizens in the Netherlands and the United Kingdom were exposed to counterfeit flu medications. Later that year, British officials impounded 5000 packets of the fake drugs.