Pharmaceutical Cargo Theft and Recovery

As organized criminal elements continue to target the pharmaceutical supply chain, FreightWatch International has reported a pharmaceutical theft and its subsequent recovery of a drug courier shipment in Michigan on August 17th.

According to FreightWatch International, the courier van that contained pharmaceutical products destined for multiple stops, originated in Livonia, Michigan on August 17th.

The van and its contents were stolen while the driver had stopped and was making a delivery at a distribution point in the Greater Detroit Metro area.

Fortunately the pharmaceutical product was equipped with a covert GPS tracker and the Detroit Metro Police was notified and they were able to recover the stolen products and arrest two suspects.

The value of the recovered stolen goods was not reported.

This is a victory in pharmaceutical supply chain security and illustrates the need and value of the deployment of a variety of technologies and solutions in properly protecting the legitimate supply chain from theft, fraud, adulteration and counterfeit product.

Secure Pharma Chain encourages that all members of the supply chain deploy a layered suite of technologies to protect their inventories and consumers.

To learn more about pharmaceutical supply chain security solutions, visit: http://www.xstreamsystems.net/.

FDA Issues Warning Letter to Perrigo Over Metal Shavings in Ibuprofen Tablets

The Detroit Free Press on May 28th reported about the FDA Warning letter sent to Perrigo Company, a generic drug developer and the largest US maker of store-brand, over-the-counter drugs.

The article written by Lori Higgins highlights the four significant violations cited by the FDA during inspections from November 17-January 14:

· Perrigo did not reject a lot of ibuprofen tablets that were contaminated by metal shavings due to an equipment failure. The FDA said that although Perrigo segregated a portion of the affected lot, it still shipped some of the lot. That resulted in a recall of the entire lot.

· Perrigo didn’t thoroughly investigate possible foreign tablet contamination in its filling equipment when it found a brown, round ibuprofen tablet from one lot included in a lot of brown, oval ibuprofen caplets. The FDA said the company should have investigated a lot of orange, round ibuprofen tablets that were packaged between the packaging of the brown, round tablets and the brown, oval caplets to ensure there was no further contamination.

· Perrigo’s quality control unit failed to follow standard operating procedures, twice resulting in the release of mislabeled products that had to be recalled.

· Perrigo failed to adequately inspect packaging and labeling facilities before use to ensure drug products had been removed from previous operations.

Additionally Ms. Higgins quotes Joann M. Givens, District Director of the Detroit FDA office in the letter. "Your firm has had an ongoing program since 2005 to address mixups. ... However, your firm continues to receive complaints regarding this issue, and despite past assurances that previous enhancements would control this problem, deviations continue."

To read the entire Detroit Free Press article, visit:
http://www.freep.com/article/20100527/BUSINESS06/100527055.

Secure Pharma Chain Blog, encourages all within the pharmaceutical supply chain to authenticate and verify their inventories from manufacturer to dispenser in order to protect the consumer from poor quality, adulteration, fraud and counterfeiting.

To learn more about supply chain authentication solutions, visit: http://www.xstreamsystems.net/.