36 Million Americans Have Bought Rx’s From Illegal Online Pharmacies

Tens of millions of Americans have bought medications online without a prescription, according to a new study.


Alaric DeArment in Drug Store News writes about a study funded by the Alliance for Save Online Pharmacies and released by The Partnership at DrugFree.org, which finds that illegal online pharmacies have sold drugs to 36 million Americans.

According to the Drug Store News story:

• Many independent and chain retail pharmacies operate websites and there also are reputable online pharmacies, such as Drugstore.com. However, a number of illegal online pharmacies also exist, and buying drugs from them opens consumers to the risk of taking counterfeit, adulterated or unapproved medications.

• “Those who sell prescription drugs online without a valid prescription are operating illegally, undercutting the laws that were put in place to protect patients, and are thereby endangering the public health,” U.S. intellectual property enforcement coordinator Victoria Espinel said. “It is a real wake-up call that so many Americans have engaged in this dangerous behavior.”

• At the White House Intellectual Property Health and Safety Forum on Tuesday, Espinel said 11 companies had joined to create a nonprofit group designed to target illegal online pharmacies, including American Express, Visa, MasterCard, PayPal, eNom, Google, Microsoft, Neustar, Network Solutions, Yahoo! and Go Daddy.

The purchase of drugs from illegal online sites is a dangerous practice that impacts the health and safety of entire consumer populations.

With these illegal purchases, the consumer is potentially bringing dangerous fakes into the legitimate supply chain. It is critical that all members of the legitimate pharmaceutical supply chain take measures to protect themselves from these dangerous sources of supply.

To read the Drug Store News story, visit: http://www.drugstorenews.com/article/companies-band-together-end-illegal-online-pharmacies

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

42 Police Raids In Argentinean Counterfeit Drug Probe

In Argentina, 42 raids were conducted as part of continuing investigations into counterfeit and illegal drug distribution by organized crime.

According to the Argentinean news organization, Momento 24, Argentinean authorities are continuing their two year investigation of counterfeit drug sellers that operate within workers' unions that involve the use of expired drugs, counterfeiting and murder.

Last week Judge Norberto Oyarbide ordered over 40 raids on suspected workers’ union sites in Capital Federal, Avellaneda, San Justo and other interior locations within Argentina.

As reported by Partnership for Safe Medicines: Among the organizations raided were employment organizations for truckers, metalworkers, air navigators, lottery, port, petrochemical, turf, post and telecommunications, teachers and automotive industries.

In Argentina, healthcare including doctor care and prescription drugs are distributed to the majority of Argentineans’ through their employment union organizations.

According to Momento 24:

• Police collected documentation on the purchase and distribution of cancer drugs, hemophilia medication and AIDS drugs.

• Police are looking for possible connections with drug companies, including San Javier of businessman Nestor Lorenzo, previously arrested and prosecuted for organized crime medicine distribution in 2009.

In earlier reports by Momento 24, Mr. Lorenzo has testified in the investigation for the murders of Sebastián Forza, Damian Ferron and Leopoldo Bina. He testified on the chain of suppliers and creditors of Forza, who, allegedly, sold a shipment of counterfeit hemophilia medications to the National Drug and Technology Agency (Anmat).

According to an earlier Momento 24 story, one of Mr. Lorenzo’s previous business partners in a small chain of drug stores, Luis Marcelo Tarzia died in jail after his arrest for allegedly being the local manager of a Mexican drug gang that set up a methamphetamine lab in Ingeniero Maschwitz.

This is a cautionary tale to industry stakeholders and consumers of pharmaceuticals within developed countries over the possible interdiction of dangerous medications within the legitimate supply chain.

Unfortunately this type of crime is becoming commonplace within the legitimate supply chain in the UK, Germany and even the United States.

Because of its high profit and low risk, counterfeiting or dealing in adulterated, fraudulent or sub-standard medications has become a lucrative trade and has drawn the attention of organized criminal elements. The real danger however is that it not only impacts those involved with the transaction but has potentially lethal implications for unsuspecting consumers who take these dangerous knock offs.

All members of the pharmaceutical supply chain must proactively take measures to protect their inventories.

To read the entire Momento 24 story, visit: http://momento24.com/en/2010/11/26/at-least-42-police-raids-on-the-case-of-counterfeit-drugs/

To read the entire story on Partnership for Safe Medicine, visit: http://www.safemedicines.org/2010/12/argentina-federales-investigate-fake-drug-crime-ring-60.html

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

China Launches New Product Piracy Crackdown

According to Bloomberg News and the Associated Press, China's government is launching a new six-month crackdown on rampant copying and counterfeiting of software, medicines and other goods.

According to the reported announcement:

• The announcement comes amid complaints by industry groups that piracy of software and some other goods is growing despite repeated government pledges to stamp it out.

• Cabinet officials said the crackdown will target a wide array of products from illegally copied computer software to corn that is falsely labeled as organic.

• Fake or illegally copied music, designer clothes, medicines and other goods are widely available in China. Industry groups say Chinese piracy costs legitimate producers billions of dollars a year in lost sales.

China leads the way in fraudulent, adulterated, sub-standard and counterfeit medications that is exported to the developed and underdeveloped nation’s pharmaceutical supply chains.

Hopefully this announcement is a serious effort on behalf of the Chinese government to protect consumers around the globe from this potentially lethal crime.

To read the entire Bloomberg News story, visit: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-11-30/china-launches-new-product-piracy-crackdown.html

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

Counterfeit Medicines: Health and Harm

Counterfeiting has a long history. For most commodities it is simply the theft of brand owners' intellectual property, a trademark violation. But fake medicines can also kill.

Political wrangling over language, and confusion over how to deal with the public health and private property aspects of counterfeiting, is hampering international action.

Charles Clift writes an excellent article for the December 2010 issue of The World Today that goes into detail and insightfully probes into the issues, aspects and consequences surrounding drug counterfeiting.

Mr. Clift’s article is a must read for both those who are schooled on the issue and the uninitiated.

Here are a few insights from Mr. Clift’s The World Today article:

• Counterfeit, falsified and substandard medicines pose a considerable threat to health. Although detailed knowledge of their prevalence and impact on human well-being is limited, they can fail to cure, promote antimicrobial resistance, and ultimately kill. The threat from these medicines is probably growing, particularly in poorer countries with weak regulation and poorly monitored distribution networks.

• Counterfeiting can be very profitable, and those who do it are becoming increasingly sophisticated, which makes patients in developing countries, who usually have to buy medicines from their own resources, particularly vulnerable.

• In the case of food, medicines, cosmetics and some other goods, counterfeiting can also pose a serious threat to human health because products are likely to be either substandard or contain positively dangerous components or ingredients. This kind of counterfeiting is thus qualitatively different from, for example, a fake Rolex watch.

• Pharmaceutical products are a rather special case for several reasons. Typically it is more difficult to decide whether a product is counterfeit or not, not least because the consumer or prescriber cannot know the contents of the medicine. Before they can be legally marketed, medical products are, at least in principle, subject to much stronger regulation concerning their safety and quality than other items. Bodies such as the Food and Drug Administration in the US are responsible, so counterfeit products will also contravene drug safety, as well as intellectual property, laws.

• The general war on counterfeits is principally about protecting markets and private intellectual property rights, but in the case of pharmaceuticals this self-interested motive is overlaid by a concern to protect public health. The combination of self-interested and altruistic motives can be confusing to observers, and suspicious to some.

• However, the issue of counterfeit medicines has recently become extremely controversial. The definition that the World Health Organization (WHO) first developed in 1992 has generated continuing controversy by conflating the concept of counterfeiting - which has a specific meaning in relation to intellectual property - with issues concerned with the quality, safety and efficacy of medicines.

• Thus, counterfeits become inextricably confused with medicines that are falsified in some other way - for example by concealing their true identity and source - and medicines that are simply substandard: not containing ingredients to the specifications required by regulatory authorities.

• In addition, concerns have been raised that anti-counterfeiting measures might lead to threats to the legitimate trade in generic drugs. These concerns were made worse by the detention in the European Union (EU) in 2008 of generic versions of brand name drugs in transit from India to other developing country markets on the grounds they were infringing European patents.

• Undoubtedly, no one supports the work of the counterfeiters, with the harm they can do to sick people. The controversies are a reflection, in part, of perceived conflicts of economic interest between countries with brand name and generic pharmaceutical industries in the means used to tackle counterfeiting, as well as substandard medicines in general.

• Overcoming these perceptions of conflicting interest, including ensuring that definitions and rules and procedures do not discriminate between generic and brand name products, will be the key to more effective anti-counterfeiting measures.

Mr. Clift’s article is an excellent encapsulation of the problem of counterfeit medications and the complexity in dealing with this deadly crime.

To read and download the entire The World Today article, visit: http://www.chathamhouse.org.uk/publications/twt/archive/view/-/id/2102/


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

Fake Drugs Mean Prison for St. Louis County Man

Man to be sentenced for trafficking in bogus erectile dysfunction drugs that were purchased on-line.

Robert Patrick in the St. Louis Post Dispatch reports about a St. Louis County man who has pleaded guilty to federal charges and admitted to selling thousands of counterfeit erectile dysfunction pills over the last several years.

According to the St. Louis Post Dispatch story:

• Mark Hughes, 47, ordered counterfeit versions of the drugs Viagra and Cialis online from China and India, and sold them either in an illegal and unlicensed pharmacy or via word of mouth, Assistant U.S. Attorney John Bodenhausen said in court.

• Hughes' last shipment, of 1,000 pills, was intercepted by U.S. Customs and Border Protection in 2009 and delivered by investigators. Hughes house was then searched and he admitted buying roughly 11,000 pills. He sold them for $5 each, roughly one-third of the wholesale price, Bodenhausen said.

• Bodenhausen said that the pills either did not contain the correct drug or contained a less potent dose of the drug.

• In court, Hughes pleaded guilty to trafficking in counterfeit goods and misbranding a drug, and could face at least two years in prison under federal sentencing guidelines when sentenced in January, depending on a number of factors.

This is an excellent cautionary tale regarding those who set out to scam people by buying bogus goods online.

Mr. Hughes is fortunate that the bogus drugs that he sold did not adversely effect the health or kill someone or he would be facing a far more serious consequences.

Bogus drugs are becoming one of the more significant health care issues of the 21st century. 11,000 doses of a potentially lethal, fraudulent or adulterated drug could poison and create a huge health care disaster within a communities population.

Kudos to U.S. Customs and Border Protection for intercepting these bogus medications.

To read the entire story, visit: http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/article_0ac42318-dad5-11df-a1ce-0017a4a78c22.html

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

Securing Pharma: Cambodian Study Finds Only 3% of Medicines are Counterfeit

Low figure compares to historical estimates of 4% to 90% in studies reported since 2000, according to the researchers.

Phil Taylor in an October 22nd post in Securing Pharma writes a blog about a recent study by Japanese researchers that shows a low percentage of counterfeits as it relates to past studies.

This research is significant because at face value the study paints a very different, more positive picture of the Cambodian pharmaceutical supply chain from previous studies which may lead to a false sense of the totality of the problem.

Highlights from the Securing Pharma post include:

• The results of a medicine sampling study in Cambodia reveals that just 3% of products were counterfeit, although between 5 and 9 % failed HPLC or dissolution-based quality testing.

• That relatively low figure compares to historical estimates of 4% to 90% in studies reported since 2000, according to the researchers, who were from Kanazawa and Nagasaki Universities in Japan and Cambodia's National Health Product Quality Control Center.

• A total of 710 samples of a wide range of commonly-used medicines were collected by the researchers in three tranches (in 2006, 2007 and 2008) at pharmacies and other forms of retail outlet in both rural and urban areas.

• A little over half (55%) of the samples collected had their packaging intact, but in 45% of cases it was open. Counterfeits were 20 times more likely to be encountered among open containers than closed one, were more likely to fail quality testing and were encountered more often in rural outlets, according to the researchers.

• Four of the counterfeits were labeled as originating from China, six were from India, two were from Malaysia and there was one each from Hong Kong, Cambodia and the UK.

Clearly the outcome of this research needs to be followed up given the apparent disparity between the results of this testing and what has been found in the past.

After one looks at the data however it would appear that although 3% were found to be specifically counterfeit there was a significant amount of issues with up to 9% of the sampling as to leave doubts to its efficacy. Simply put Cambodia has a huge health care issue as it relates to the safety of its pharmaceutical supply chain.

Adulterated, sub-standard, fraudulent and counterfeit drugs impact the health and safety of entire populations in developed and underdeveloped nations by poisoning the consumer, not properly treating diseases, creating drug resistant disease or at best scamming the patient out of his or her intended treatment.

Secure Pharma Chain encourages all within the pharmaceutical supply chain (regulatory agencies, manufacturers, distributors and dispensers) to use best procurement practices when purchasing their raw materials and inventories and to deploy technologies and solutions that will interdict these potentially lethal fakes from reaching the consumer.

To view Phil Taylor’s Securing Pharma article, visit: http://www.securingpharma.com/40/articles/624.php

To view the research published in Pharmaceutical Research, visit: http://www.springerlink.com/content/kj17835007x13471/

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

Global Pharmaceutical Sales Expected to Rise to $880bn in 2011

IMS Health predicts that global drug sales will increase 5 to 7 per cent next year, driven by development of innovative pharmaceuticals and growth of emerging markets. Secure Pharma Chain sees this as a major driver to continued proliferation of counterfeit medications.

In-PharmaTechnologist published a story yesterday on the IMS report regarding the rise in global drug sales for 2011.

The report shows that although there will “constraints” to the traditional developed markets because of the loss of major drugs to patent protections, significant growth in emerging markets globally will still mean continued growth.

Secure Pharma Chain anticipates that based on the information in this report, the growth in the emerging markets in China will result in still higher growth in substandard, fraudulent, adulterated and counterfeit medications in 2011.

This estimation is driven by industry experts like Terry Hisey from Deloitte and the World Health Organization, significantly raising their estimates in 2010 as to the annual global value of counterfeit medications to a range from $75b to $200b with a annual growth rate of 12to 15 per cent.

These factors and the state of the global economy in general mean that the global pharmaceutical market place will face many challenges going forward.

Secure Pharma Chain encourages all members of the pharmaceutical supply chain to protect their inventories from this growing threat by deploying technologies and solutions designed to authenticate and validate products within the supply channel.

Included in the In-PharmaTechnologist article:

• China is expected to enter 2011 as the third largest pharmaceutical market after the US and Japan, overtaking Germany with a predicted 25 per cent growth and $50bn in sales.

• By 2015, annual spending on prescription drugs in another 16 emerging markets is expected to increase by at least $1bn, which for the lowest spender in the group, Vietnam, will mark a doubling of this year’s expenditure.

• Innovative products in areas of stroke prevention, melanoma, multiple sclerosis, breast cancer and hepatitis C are expected to enter the market next year, representing 30-35 new chemical and biological entities with five predicted to reach blockbuster status.

• While 2011 is expected to bring global drugs sales of $880-890bn, “the underlying constraints to growth in developed markets are stronger than ever”, according to Murray Aitken, Senior Vice President at IMS, with “major drugs losing patent protection and facing generic competition for the first time”. The new potential blockbuster drugs are not expected to provide market growth “beyond what we’ve seen in the past 3 years which is at historically low levels”.

To read the entire In-PharmaTechnologist article, visit: http://www.in-pharmatechnologist.com/Industry-Drivers/IMS-prediction-Emerging-markets-front-5-7-rise-in-drug-sales-for-2011

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

Thai Government Promises to Crack Down on Counterfeit Drugs

Thailand has decided to crack down seriously on counterfeit medicine, and nine concerned government agencies have inked a memorandum of understanding to join forces.

According to a September 29th issue of The Nation, nine Thai government agencies are signing a Memo of Understanding linking their efforts to fight counterfeit drugs in part due to the United States putting Thailand on a Priority Watch List as it relates to Intellectual Property Rights and Trade.

The nine Thai agencies are the Customs Department, Food and Drug Administration, Department of Special Investigation, Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers Association, Royal Thai Police, Information and Communications Technology Ministry, Central Institute of Forensic Science, Office of the Attorney-General for Intellectual Property and International Trade, and the Commerce Ministry's Intellectual Property Department.

According to The Nation:

• Deputy Commerce Minister Alongkorn Ponlaboot said yesterday that these agencies would suppress not just the distribution of counterfeit medicines, but also trademark violators. The sale of fake medication not only costs the country thousands of billions of baht a year but also adversely affects consumers' health, he warned.

• The government is promising to crack down on violators of intellectual-property rights so Washington can review Thailand's status in relation to trade.

• "These fake products have caused more damage than we can estimate because the agencies working on this do not share information enough," Alongkorn said.

• Last year, the government seized 145,000 tablets of counterfeit medicine worth Bt58 million. This does not include the many illegal products that have been smuggled across the border.

• Under the MoU, the agencies will join forces not just to suppress fake products but to demolish processing plants, Alongkorn said.

• The plan is also to inform the public about the adverse effects of purchasing counterfeit goods.

• "The US will review its trading partners' status under Article 301 of the Trade Law next month. Our plan is to persuade Washington to remove Thailand from its Priority Watch List," he said.

Secure Pharma Chain is encouraged by the actions of the Thai government and by the United States in pressuring their trading partners to be more active in their enforcement.

To read the entire The Nation article, visit: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/home/2010/09/29/business/Serious-crackdown-on-counterfeit-drugs-planned-30138956.html

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

Interpol Starting Operation Against Counterfeit Drugs in Russia

First large scale initiative by Interpol in Russia against bogus medications.

ITAR-Tass reported on September 27th that Interpol Russia is initiating a large-scale operation against fake medicines.

Police Major General Timur Lakhonin, who heads Russia’s Interpol Bureau, is quoted in an interview with the Rossiyskaya Gazeta :

• “At present, a special raid was launched to detect the channel of counterfeit medicines. This is a new direction in our work. We found 1,200 websites in the Internet that sell fake medicines. These medicines are now being seized. The operation is underway in 25 countries and now it begins in Russia,” he said.

• “The most dangerous segment of the black market is counterfeiting of different antibiotics, contraceptives, steroids and weight loss medicines,” Lakhonin said.

This is a significant step forward for enforcing a critical health care problem and major criminal activity in Russia a country who is considered to have a relatively high percentage of its pharmaceutical supply chain impacted by fake drugs.

Secure Pharma Chain endorses more aggressive law enforcement against this criminal act but also encourages pharmaceutical supply chain members to proactively deploy technologies and best practice solutions to protect their inventories and consumers from these potentially lethal fakes.

To read the ITAR-TASS article, visit: http://www.itar-tass.com/eng/level2.html?NewsID=15533991&PageNum=0

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

Eli Lilly: Efforts to Stop Counterfeit Medications

"The private sector must stand ready to partner with the public sector in tackling this problem."

Lilly Pad, a new corporate blog from Eli Lilly, posted a feature on September 13th written by Amy O’Connor regarding counterfeit medications.

Ms. O’Conner blogs about the Eli Lilly perspective on counterfeiting and cites some of the recent articles in the media regarding this deadly act.

Highlighted in the blog:

• A common misperception is that counterfeits and generics are the same thing. The counterfeiters can make significant profits from generics, and in some cases more profit if there is a higher volume of demand. To categorize them as such is unfair to the world’s generic drug producers. Legitimate products, either branded or generic, must go through stringent regulatory approval processes before going on the market. In most countries, both generic and branded drug makers are bound by Good Manufacturing Practices (GMPs) that are designed to ensure product potency, safety and efficacy.

• Lilly remains committed to patient safety in the face of this growing problem. Our company has initiated a broad range of actions to aggressively protect our patients against the exploitative actions of criminal counterfeiters. This includes the addition of enhanced Anti-Counterfeiting technologies for Lilly products and packaging in our retail product portfolio, and changes in our distribution system.

• We actively partner with government, non-government organizations, and trade associations to strengthen, enact, and enforce Anti-Counterfeiting laws, and to raise awareness among governments and with patients. The private sector must stand ready to partner with the public sector in tackling this problem. However, without more rigorous international cooperation to improve regulations, laws and penalties related to counterfeiting medicines and also enforce them, the consequences for worldwide patient safety will be serious.

Secure Pharma Chain endorses Eli Lilly’s continued commitment to combating this deadly global epidemic and encourages other members of the pharmaceutical supply chain (manufacturers, distributors and dispensers) to deploy technologies and solutions to protect their brands and consumers.

Secure Pharma Chain also welcomes Lilly Pad to the world of corporate blogs and looks forward to following and reading its contributions and insights.

To read the Lilly Pad blog, visit: http://lillypad.lilly.com/public-policy/efforts-to-stop-counterfeit-medications.

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

How the Current Economy Will Drive Counterfeit and Fraudulent Medications

By: Alan Clock, Senior Vice President, XStream Systems, Inc.

The following is a re-post of a Secure Pharma Chain commentary blog from October 30th, 2009.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has estimated that in 2010 the value of counterfeit medications worldwide will be approximately $75 billion. This is an increase from $35b in 2006 and it is now estimated that 10% of the global pharmaceutical supply chain is or will be counterfeit or fraudulent.

Although this estimate is dramatic in its size and growth, the WHO came up with this estimate prior to the true realization of the global financial meltdown and its impact on the world’s economies. As the impact of the financial meltdown continues to trickle through the populations of the developed countries it is anticipated by many that the worldwide estimates of counterfeit and fraudulent drugs may in fact grow beyond the $75b and begin to mirror the growth to those of emerging and non-developed countries.

Several economic factors will likelly drive this growth beyond the 2010 WHO estimates:

The rising costs of pharmaceuticals will simply become too much for many consumers to afford, especially when coupled with job loss, loss of health benefits or underemployment. Affordability will drive many to nefarious sources like the internet and many will fall prey to unscrupulous deals for bogus medications.

The lack of comprehensive laws or the ability to catch those who counterfeit, adulterate or fraudulent deal in bogus pharmaceuticals. Simply put it is very unlikely that those who perpetrate the crime will be caught or suffer any real consequence for their deeds.

The high profitability of the crime of counterfeit and fraudulent medications. It is widely accepted that anyone dealing in this crime will likely profit many times more than others dealing illicit street drugs.

Lack of regulatory oversight of the legitimate pharmaceutical supply chain which allows for systematic gaps in the supply chain that can be exploited by those with criminal intent.

The globalization of the manufacturing and raw materials process. Most medications consumed in developed countries have been outsourced to non-developed countries for economic reasons. This creates huge gaps in the quality of the product and lack of regulatory oversight which is critical and necessary for the protection of the supply chain from criminal enterprises.

Solutions to this issue within the pharmaceutical supply chain are also heavily impacted by the global economy. Track and Trace, Taggants, Serialization, Pedigree and Authentication solutions are all very effective in dealing with counterfeit, fraudulent and adulterated drugs but diminishing capital expenditures budgets and tight margins by manufacturers, repackagers, distributors and dispensers are hampering the deployment of the tools needed to eradicate this very dangerous threat to public health. Without regulatory mandates or incentives, businesses cannot easily justify the expense of solutions until or unless their business is or has been affected by counterfeit and fraudulent medications.

The initial WHO estimates were troubling enough but it would appear that based on the current economic conditions their predictions may prove to be more optimistic than what we may ultimately realize in our global pharmaceutical supply chain.

To learn more about solutions to combat counterfeit, fraudulent and adulterated medication, visit: http://www.xstreamsystems.net/.

Comparison and Combination of Spectroscopic Techniques for Detection of Counterfeit Medicines

ScienceDirect.com has made available an online report comparing spectroscopic techniques in the detection of counterfeit medications.

In this highly technical report, scientists studied Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), near infrared spectroscopy (NIR) and Raman spectroscopy to determine which techniques and associations were the best for discriminating genuine from counterfeit and imitations samples.

The medications tested were counterfeit and imitations of Viagra and Cialis two of the most counterfeited products globally.

According to the report:

It is shown that for the Viagra® samples, the best results were provided by a combination of FT-IR and NIR spectroscopy. On the other hand, the best results for the Cialis® samples were provided by the combination of NIR and Raman spectroscopy (1400–1190 cm−1).

These techniques not only permitted a clear discrimination between genuine and counterfeit or imitation samples but also the distinction of clusters among illegal samples. This might be interesting for forensic investigations by authorities.

Secure Pharma Chain endorses all techniques and testing as it relates to being able to detect and interdict fraudulent, adulterated and counterfeit medication however technologies are in use today within the supply chain that allow for the accurate testing of pharmaceuticals within their sealed, unit of sale container.

Unlike Spectroscopy, these technologies do not require destruction or degradation of the product, laboratory testing or technicians to run and analyze testing results.

EDXRD allows the end user to deploy forensic level testing without opening up the container for testing or sample prep. Additionally EDXRD can accurately test products within the supply chain by warehouse resources within seconds.

To date the EDXRD testing has accurately, efficiently and effectively protected the supply chain end user from receiving or shipping adulterated, fraudulent or counterfeit drugs including Cialis and Viagra.

Spectroscopy is an excellent technology when you need very specific forensic sampling, but when you need to know if your inventories are safe before you ship them,

you don't need a laboratory to interdict counterfeit medications.

To read the entire survey report, visit: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6TGX-504127R-1&_user=10&_coverDate=11%2F02%2F2010&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=f9acd7f0661b04a5da0138dbac9966fa.

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

Sudan Combats Sale of Counterfeit Drugs

Countries in Africa continue to fight the incredibly deadly crime of counterfeit medications which attacks and kills many within underdeveloped nations.

The following story comes from the August 7th edition of the Sudan Tribune and describes how the Sudanese government wages a war against counterfeiters who blatantly shop their dangerous wares on an unsophisticated population.

In Africa, where counterfeit medications can make up over 50% of a nation’s pharmaceutical supply chain, the issue of bogus drugs is at epidemic proportions and its impact on the health and well being of these populations is increasingly more deadly.

Consumers in developed nations should not feel comfortable that they are immune from the dangers of these criminal acts.

Because of huge profits, the likelihood that they will avoid legal punishment and without consumers or regulatory agencies on guard against it, counterfeiters are even more incentivized to ply their deadly inventories within developed nation’s legitimate supply chains.

The following are the highlights from the Sudan Tribune article:

· A megaphone atop a double cabin land cruiser roamed Luonyaker main market on Friday warning customers that some unscrupulous persons have flooded most of the rural towns with fake medicines purportedly to cure all diseases.
· In Southern Sudan, even those selling fake drugs are vulnerable to counterfeiting. Wol Kon Laau, head of Yiik Adoor Primary Health Care Unit in Gogrial East County, Warrap State, said the common use of counterfeit or sub-standard pharmaceuticals means many patients wait too long to seek proper medical attention.
· "As a practitioner I have had examples to give. I encountered most of them when I was practicing as a medical student that certain drugs were brought in into the system even in the normal delivery system which were of low quality and it even becomes worse with the drug peddlers who are going about villages killing people," he added.
· A salesman without medical background says his Capsule cures high blood pressure, arthritis, kidney disease, premature menopause, cardiovascular disease, and infertility, saying it might be correct but this requires prescription from medical practitioners not by assumption.
· "Fake and counterfeited products usually involve products that are either high volume or high cost. So you look mostly at anti-Malarial currently the Artemisinine combination therapy. In addition to that there are products for erectile dysfunction and because these are often sold at pubs and places where people try to get them without prescription they go for high value, they go for high cost," he explained.
· "With me in the committee we go on the market. We sample products, and we publish the results so that we can name and shame. We hope that within 18 months Southern Sudan in general and Warrap state in particular should be able to have very decent data on the extent of the quality problem in the area," said Laau.
· He says that this will give health officials a better sense of the scale of the problem and allow for the eventual prosecution of those purposely endangering public health.

To learn more about technology and solutions to combat counterfeit medications, visit: http://www.xstreamsystems.net/.

To read the entire Sudan Tribune article, visit: http://www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article35875.

SecuringPharma: Medicine Seizures by EU Customs Rise Again in 2009

Phil Taylor in a July 23rd post in SecuringPharma.com writes about the increase in the seizure of pharmaceuticals from 2008 to 2009.

Although overall there were fewer detained shipments from 2008 to 2009 apparently “the downturn did not extend to medicinal products”.

Also in the blog, Mr. Taylor adds some curious statistics as to what countries lead the way in originating and presumably supplying many of the interdicted medications.

It would appear that the criminal elements behind counterfeiting must be realizing the high profit and low risk associated with pharmaceutical counterfeiting which means a far higher risk to consumers everywhere.

Secure Pharma Chain encourages all regulatory and pharmaceutical supply chain members utilize solutions and technologies such as XStream Systems’ XT250 to authenticate and secure supply chain transactions and inventories to protect the end use consumers.

Here are some of the highlights and interesting statistics from Mr. Taylor’s post:

· Customs officers in the European Union detained fewer shipments suspected of infringing intellectual property rights in 2009 compared to 2008, but sadly that downturn did not extend to medicinal products.

· Overall medicines accounted for around 10 per cent of all the 118 million articles intercepted by EU customs last year, and 8 per cent of the 43,500 individual cases.

· In absolute terms, the number of seized medical products rose to around 11.5 million from a little under 9 million in 2008, which in turn was double the number in 2007.

· The origins of the intercepted medicine shipments also makes interesting reading with 74 per cent of the articles coming from United Arab Emirates - a well-known hub for goods in transit from other markets into the EU - and 23 per cent coming from India.

· China featured highly among other industrial sectors such as apparel and electronics, but was the source in just 1.4 per cent of medicinal product detentions. The only other country of origin worth mentioning was Syria, with around 1 per cent of the total.

To read SecuringPharma’s post, visit: http://www.securingpharma.com/40/articles/532.php.

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

AllAfrica.com: Nigerian Customs Hands Fake Drug Importer to NAFDAC

As reported in the June 29th edition of AllAfrica.com, the Nigerian Customs Service FCT handed over a suspected fake drug and contraband textile materials importer to the Nigerian National Agency for Food, Drugs and Control (NAFDAC).

According to All Africa.com:

· In a press conference, Usman K. Bellow, the Customs Area Comptroller, FTC Command stated that the suspect, Mrs Anyaoha Ngozi Margret was arrested at the airport with 12 bags of CIPRO tabs 500mg and 87 veils of textile materials.He said following the request from NAFDAC, the Comptroller General of Customs, Abdullahi Dikko Inde approved the handing over of the suspect and the medicaments to them.
· Bello said it is very disheartening to see Nigerian traders importing fake medicaments with the intention of selling to unsuspected Nigerians who will eventually be harm by the drugs.
· He said: "It is really a very bad and sad way of making money while killing innocent Nigerians. It should be noted that importation of pharmaceuticals are allowed by law. These items are dutiable not banned but there is a procedure such as registration of NAFDAC etc."
· The comptroller also warned Nigerians to desist from smuggling contraband goods such as textile materials, adding that the nefarious crime is responsible for crippling the country's economy especially the manufacturing sector.

Secure Pharma Chain Blog is encouraged by this latest interdiction in Nigeria an area impacted especially hard by the deadly crime of pharmaceutical counterfeiting and encourages all members of the pharmaceutical supply chain to enhance their protection of inventories by deploying anti-counterfeiting technologies and solutions.

To read the entire AllAfrica.com story, visit: http://allafrica.com/stories/201006300123.html.

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

in-Pharma Technologist: Sanofi Works to Secure Egyptian Drug Supply Chain

French drug maker Sanofi-Aventis continues to spearhead the fight for a more secure pharmaceutical supply chain by launching an anti-counterfeit medication initiative in Egypt

Wai Lang Chu on June 23rd posted a story on in-Pharma Technologist about the mega Pharma manufacturer working within Egyptian authorities on addressing and countering the growing problem of drug manufacturing infiltration and drug counterfeiting in Egypt.

The following are some of the highlights of the posting:

· The move (by Sanofi) is the first of a three-phase initiative undertaken by the drug company and the Egyptian Ministry of Health to try to address and counter the growing problem of drug manufacturing infiltration and medicine counterfeiting in the country.
· Under the new project, Sanofi have worked alongside the country’s authorities providing them with guidance and training on the latest techniques in identifying counterfeit medication.
· Staff from Sanofi led an Egyptian delegation including officials from the Ministry of Health, the Customs Authority and the Ministry of Interior's Anti-smuggling Unit from the Ministry of Finance, to its Central Anti-Counterfeit Laboratory based in Tours, France.
· The delegation also visited the Customs Authority located in Le Havre to examine its anti-smuggling measures before visiting the French Ministry of Health.
· Over the last couple of years Sanofi have been making significant ground on tackling the problem of counterfeit drugs. Its Tours laboratories, opened in 2008, are the first of its kind and illustrate the measures pharma companies have to go to in order to secure it manufacturing and worldwide production capabilities.
· For example, Sanofi’s laboratories routinely conduct direct examinations of packaging items and leaflets as well as definitive chemical tests on suspect samples of commonly counterfeited products.
· Staff at the lab have developed test methods, distributing them globally in order to allow industrial plants to inspect and test, with the same criteria, the suspect products corresponding to those manufactured by Sanofi-Aventis.
· The drug firm have also introduced centralised ‘Identity Cards’ for the counterfeit drugs found, in a single, central data base, to make it possible to compare different types of counterfeit. · Sanofi’s collaboration with Egypt is part of efforts by its Government to tackle a problem that is picked up on globally and tarnishes the county’s reputation. Data from Business Monitor International (BMI) has identified Egypt as having made significant progress in tackling the counterfeit drug problem in the last two years.

Secure Pharma Chain Blog endorses the joint effort of industry and regulatory authorities working together to solve this insidious, deadly criminal act and encourages all members of the global pharmaceutical chain to work closely with government agencies in their anti-counterfeiting efforts.

The most effective processes to interdict fraud, adulteration and counterfeit medications includes a multi-layered approach of authentication technology solutions within the supply chain from production to dispensing.

It will take all members of the pharmaceutical supply chain, working together to solve this deadly crime to the consumer. No single link in the chain can effectively or successfully eradicate bogus drugs by itself.

To read the entire in-Pharma Technologist story, visit: http://www.in-pharmatechnologist.com/Industry-Drivers/Sanofi-works-to-secure-Egyptian-drug-supply-chain/?c=qendTuKNp6H%2BO0zFmrXycw%3D%3D&utm_source=newsletter_daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Newsletter%2BDaily.

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

Health Canada Provides Counterfeit Health Products Guidance

Health Canada, the official Canadian governmental regulatory agency charged with the responsibility of the countries public health, has released a guidelines document on the public health issue of the counterfeiting of health products and outlines how the agency intends to identify and manage health risks associated with fakes.

According to Diana Dowhwaithe, Health Canada’s Director General the document is meant "to manage the risk to Canadians and to have the counterfeit product removed from market using the most appropriate level of intervention and notifying parties at risk."

The purpose of the new guidelines document is to help Health Canada's inspectorate and enforcement officials focus on potential vulnerabilities in health product "manufacturing, packaging/labelling, wholesaling, importation, distribution, sale and use."

The scope of the guidance covers finished medicinal products, raw materials and ingredients used in their manufacture and primary and secondary packaging, as well as advertising materials used to promote products.

It also lays out a detailed definition for counterfeiting, noting that - in general - the term does not cover: diverted products (although these could serve as an indicator of counterfeit distribution); products using patented ingredients/design but which do not mislead or claim to originate from the rights holder; and products which do not disclose all ingredients or have labelling issues.

The document defines counterfeit medical products as:

"A counterfeit health product is one that is represented as, and likely to be mistaken for, an authentic product. Counterfeiting can apply to both branded and generic products, and could relate to a product’s identity or source, could include products with the correct ingredients/components, with the wrong ingredient/components, without active ingredients, with insufficient active ingredients or with misleading packaging or labelling."

The lone point of contention of the document by Secure Pharma Chain Blog's perspective is the report's minimizing of the potential risk to the Canadian population of counterfeit health care products, which runs counter to most relevant statistics, trends and generally acceptated authorities opinion's of the growing nature of this potentially deadly threat.

Secure Pharma Chain Blog endorses the continued enforcement, guidance and improved focus of all regulatory agencies in dealing with fraudulent, adulterated and counterfeit medications and medical products and encourages all members of the pharmaceutical supply chains to utilize solutions and technologies to protect their inventories and healthcare consumers.

To learn about supply chain solutions to pharmaceutical counterfeiting, visit: www.xstreamsystems.net.

To read the entire document from Health Canada, visit:
http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/dhp-mps/alt_formats/pdf/compli-conform/activit/pol_0048_counterfeit-contrefacon_eng.pdf.

Dubai Seizes 7 million Counterfeit Pills in a Private Company Warehouse

Zawya.com reports about a press conference held on May 31st by Dubai Customs announcing a seizure of a large amount of counterfeit medicine in a warehouse of a registered local company at the Dry Port in Dubai.

The seizure of 7 million counterfeit pills of different medication is considered one of the largest seizures in the region.

According to Zawya.com:

· H.E. Ahmed Butti Ahmed, Executive Chairman of Ports, Customs and Free Zone Corporation and Dubai Customs Director General issued a statement during a media conference.

· H.E. Ahmed Butti Ahmed clarified in the statement that the seized medicine is locally prohibited as approved by the tests conducted on its samples and is of counterfeited sexual supplements which bear trademarks of international companies.

· The case is considered an infringement of legal protection of the companies owning such trademarks and a clear violation of the UAE health legislations which prevents selling this medicine unless a medical prescription is issued by a licensed human doctor- as per the ministerial decisions issued under the law of pharmacy profession and pharmaceutical institutions.

· H.E. Ahmed Butti Ahmed said that the investigations conducted by Dubai Customs revealed that an employee working in the implicated company stored the medicine after receiving it from an Arab trader. He kept the haul on a quay at the Dry Port Customs Centre which belongs to the referred company, without notifying the manager of the company who was outside the UAE, in exchange of AED 3000 a month.

· H.E. Dubai Customs Director General expressed his appreciation to the Customs Intelligence employees for the proper handling of the information they received about this counterfeited medicine which played a major role in seizing it. He also praised Customs inspectors for their vigilance as they work night and day to secure the country and the great role of the IPR Department at Dubai Customs in this regard.

To read the entire story on Zawya.com, visit:

http://www.zawya.com/story.cfm/sidZAWYA20100531105654/Dubai%20Customs%20seizes%207%20million%20counterfeit%20pills%20in%20a%20private%20company%20warehouse%20in%20Dry%20Port.

This large seizure shows the vulnerability of the international pharmaceutical supply chain and the various nefarious entities that are impacted by this criminal act.

Secure Pharma Chain Blog endorses that all members of the pharmaceutical supply chain use of authentication technologies to protect and verify their inventories and protect health care consumers.

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

The Counterfeiter

In an article that appeared in the February 1st edition of TheScientist.com online magazine, they highlight the stories and the overall themes and statistics of some of the more egregious examples of counterfeit fraud in recent years.

This excellent article highlights the necessity of supply chain solutions for the verification and authentication of pharmaceuticals in their unit of sale containers.

To read the article, visit: http://www.the-scientist.com/article/display/57108/

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

Counterfeit Medications: A Terrorist Threat

Officials fear toxic ingredient in Botox could become terrorist tool.

A recent Washington Post article chronicles a specific threat of counterfeit Botox being produced by organized criminal gangs and suspected ties to terrorist organizations.

The concern among many is that counterfeit medications could be used as a tool for terrorist organizations to have access to dangerous lethal material, have the ability to spread a toxic material to target consumers around the globe and be used as a profit making enterprise to fund their worldwide operations.

To view the Washington Post article, visit: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/24/AR2010012403013.html?hpid=topnews

To learn more about pharmaceutical anti-counterfeiting technologies, visit:

www. xstreamsystems.net.