Monday, January 3, 2011

MD News: Counterfeit Drugs Prove to be an Increasing Problem



The economic downturn and continuously rising drug prices can influence consumers to seek cheaper prescriptions and over-the-counter drugs from unauthorized providers and online sources.

MD News, America's leading business and practice management magazine for physicians reports on the Pharmaceutical Security Institute report regarding growth of counterfeit drugs and how physicians need to be counseling their patients on the dangers of bogus medications.

Highlighted in the MD News story:

• The Pharmaceutical Security Institute (PSI) reports that counterfeit drugs have tripled since 2004 to a startling 1,700 incidents worldwide in 2009. It is estimated that the size of the counterfeit drug market ranges from $75 billion to $200 billion each year. PSI suspects this number to likely be much larger since most cases of counterfeit drugs are hard to detect.

• Stress to your patients the serious consequences of purchasing counterfeit drugs. These fakes may include too much, too little or none of the ingredients found in the real medications, which could be detrimental to a patient’s health.

Healthcare professionals need to a primary conduit in informing their patients and the healthcare consumer of the dangers of fraudulent, adulterated, sub-standard and counterfeit drugs.

Today more than ever the populations around the globe are all at risk from the effects of the proliferation of these potentially lethal fakes.


To read the entire MD News story, visit: http://www.mdnews.com/news/2010_12/national_dec10_counterfeit-drugs-prove-to-be-an-increasing-problem

To learn more about pharmaceutical anti-counterfeiting solutions, visit: http://www.xstreamsystems.net/

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