SafeMeds: Mississippi Stores Selling Counterfeit Drugs Raided

Operation Knock Out Knock Offs- A law enforcement partnership in Mississippi between federal, state and local officials, yields approximately 30 federal search warrants in search of counterfeit pharmaceuticals.

According to a press release from the Mississippi’s Attorney General’s Office and a blog post in SafeMeds:

• On November 18, a team of nearly 100 law enforcement agents from the U.S. Attorney’s Office-Northern and Southern Districts (MS), the Department of Homeland Security/Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the Food and Drug Administration and the Mississippi Attorney General’s Office, participated in raids via Mississippi’s Operation Knock Out Knock-Offs Task Force.

• "[The raids are] a key example of how Operation Knock Out Knock-Offs is working in Mississippi," said Attorney General Jim Hood. "By partnering with federal and local officials, we can help protect consumers from dangerous fakes."

• The first part of the operation focused on creating the state task force and the second phase centered around educating consumers and vendors about the dangers of counterfeit drugs. The operation received additional federal funding in October and will continue into next year.

• "We are just getting started," said Hood. "Counterfeiters are on notice that we mean business."

• From February 2010 to November 2010 undercover agents made dozens of purchases of counterfeit drugs at “convenience type businesses” throughout the Magnolia State. These counterfeit drugs reportedly included fake pain killers, antibiotics and birth control medication along with supplements not approved for sale in America.

• "Unapproved, uncleared, or misbranded products pose a clear and present danger to the public health," said David W. Bourne, Special Agent in Charge of U.S. Food and Drug Administration's Office of Criminal Investigations Miami Field Office. "We will continue to join with our law enforcement counterparts to aggressively pursue those who place consumers at risk for their own financial gain."

• "The smuggling of substandard, tainted or counterfeit products violates U.S. laws and regulations and threatens public health and safety," said, Raymond R. Parmer, Jr., special agent in charge of the ICE Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) office in New Orleans. "Our ability to work together across the federal government and with agencies around the world is a strong and appropriate response to a growing international threat."

The deadly criminal phenomenon of counterfeit medications is not limited to underdeveloped countries. These products exist, have significant consequence to the consumer and have the ability to become part of the legitimate supply chain.

All members of the legitimate supply chain must proactively protect their inventories and customers from these lethal fakes.

To read the entire SafeMeds post, visit: http://www.safemedicines.org/2010/11/mississippi-stores-selling-counterfeit-drugs-raided-51.html

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

PSI Statistics on Pharmaceutical Counterfeits Cited on SafeMeds

The Pharmaceutical Security Institute (PSI), a pharmaceutical manufacturer organization that tracks and investigates counterfeit drugs globally, recently released updated survey finding statistics on SafeMedicines.org regarding drug counterfeiting.

According to the PSI data, drug counterfeiting has increased by 9.2 percent worldwide over the past year.

Other key survey findings include:

· Variety of Pharmaceutical Products Increasing: There were 808 types of counterfeit pharmaceutical products identified in 2009, up more than 36 percent from 2008.

· Geographical Locations More Diverse: Counterfeits were detected in 118 countries in 2008.

· Counterfeit Drugs Going Wholesale: In 531 incidents, counterfeit products reached licensed wholesale distributors and/or pharmacies in 48 different countries. 472 of the 978 counterfeit medicine seizures made by law enforcement were of "commercial" size.

To read the entire Safe Medicines.org posting, visit: http://www.safemedicines.org/2010/06/partnership-for-safe-medicines-psm-joins-with-irish-patients-association-to-combat-counterfeit-medicine-threat.html

The prevalence of this deadly criminal act continues to grow globally within developed and non-developed countries and impacting the health and well being of hundreds of millions of healthcare consumers.

Secure Pharma Chain Blog endorses global regulatory agencies and the members of the various pharmaceutical supply chains to deploy technologies to interdict nefarious product and to verify the authenticity of their inventories.

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

SafeMeds Weekly: Counterfeit Drug Sentencing Less Than Adequate

In an opinion piece posted on SafeMeds Weekly on August 10, 2009, Marvin D. Shepherd, PhD discusses the issue of light sentencing given to those convicted of counterfeiting medications around the globe. Dr. Shepherd asserts that inadequate sentencing “undermines the seriousness and true threat that counterfeit drugs pose to society and public health.”

Dr. Shepherd sites several examples:

• After nearly two years under investigation, the final sentence for running an international multi-million pound counterfeit medication operation was issued in the United Kingdom. The first four convictions were made in September 2007 and on July 6, the final member of the operation received a 12 month sentence, suspended for two years, for masterminding an industrial scale conspiracy of supplying counterfeit drugs between 2002 and 2005. In total, the seven convicted members of this international counterfeit drug ring received a combined 17.5 years imprisonment-an average of 2.5 years for each participant-for their part in the U.K. distribution arm of a global ring operating from China, India and Pakistan, extending to the Caribbean and the United States.


• In March 2009, an Arizona couple received at most eight years imprisonment for running an illegal drug business netting more than $2.5 million from 2004 to 2006. In comparison, convicted members of an illegal recreational drug ring would receive mandatory minimum sentences starting at 20 years up to life imprisonment for distribution in the United States.

In this article Dr. Shepherd questions the logic of not holding those responsible for the distribution and sale of counterfeit drugs to the same severity to those who commit similar offenses with illicit drugs. Basically he believes that until this is done the individuals and organizations responsible for this very real threat will continue to flourish.

XStream Systems favors stricter and more stringent enforcement and criminal penalties across the globe for those convicted of manufacturing, distributing or selling counterfeit or adulterated medications. XStream also encourages those within the pharmaceutical supply chain to screen and test their inventories with solutions such as XStream’s XT250 which allows the user to test and authenticate product inside its sealed container without destroying product or opening the container. The XT250 is designed to be deployed and used within the supply chain onsite and does not require technical resources to operate.

To read the opinion piece and to learn more about SafeMeds Weekly, visit their site at www.safemedicines.org.

To learn more about XStream Systems, XT250, visit us at www.xstreamsystems.net.