Fake pills that kill not cure

TODAY Newspaper
1 September 2006

It is a ''pharmaceutical industry'' worth as much as $8 billion, but its products — counterfeit medicines — are more likely to kill you than heal you.

One to 2 per cent of the world's pharmaceuticals are counterfeit, estimates Dr Harvey Bale, the director-general of the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Associations, who was in Singapore for a conference last week.

This insidious trade is growing, he said, especially in Asia, Africa and Latin America.

All countries in Asia are affected, both as counterfeit producers and as consumers, with China and India the worst perpetrators, said Dr Bale.

China produces a lot of ''high-class'' counterfeit medicines headed for the European market, such as anti-cholesterol medicines and drugs for erectile dysfunction, while India manufactures ''basic'' counterfeits such as anti-malarial drugs, antibiotics and painkillers.

''These very old, very common, very cheap drugs are still being counterfeited because of the volume,'' he said, and they are prescribed most prevalently in countries such as Vietnam and Thailand and Indonesia — countries that ironically need them most.

At least 53 per cent of anti-malaria drugs in South-east Asia are available without prescription and contain no artesunate, the active ingredient to treat malaria, according to Oxford University researchers. This is an increase from 38 per cent in 1999. The researchers counted at least 12 different fake anti-malarial medicines in circulation.

In Vietnam, said Dr Bale, as much as 40 per cent of anti-malarial drugs are fake. ''If you have malaria and take counterfeit medicine, you will die,'' he said.

Dr Bale, who is also president of the Pharmaceutical Security Institute, said the number of counterfeiting incidents his organisation measured between 2004 and last year rose by about one-third. If not stopped, it could hit $15 billion by 2010.

The World Health Organization is intensifying efforts to stop drug pirates and has set up an enforcement group, with Interpol taking a more active role.

But counterfeiters are notoriously hard to track down. Many operate out of homes, backyards or small-scale factories.

''The Internet trade also contributes,'' said Dr Bale. ''What we need is a more systematic, more concentrated effort and cooperation between the police and private companies.''

He advocates harsher punishment beyond fines and minimal jail time for the counterfeiters. ''Clearly, if many people are dying, it comes to a case of manslaughter or even murder.''