Fake Syndrome

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: Are you worried about the safety of your medicines? You have every reason to be. Chances are the most frequently prescribed medicines such as painkillers, cough medicines, antibiotics or anti-inflammatory tablets that you pick up from the neighbourhood chemist are counterfeit. Medicines for treating cancer, HIV, malaria, diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular disease, Alzheimer’s disease, erectile dysfunction, asthma and fungal infections might be fake too. Medications for weight and hair loss aren’t spared either.

While the extent of counterfeiting in the pharmaceuticals industry has reached alarming proportions globally, India is not immune to this malaise. The government has recently amended the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, providing for stricter penalties to those engaged in making of spurious, adulterated, misbranded and substandard medicines.

Put simply, custodial sentences now start from a minimum of three years to life imprisonment, while fines for those found guilty of selling fake medicines range from Rs 10 lakh or three times the value of confiscated goods whichever is more. Earlier, the law prescribed imprisonment for five years and a minimum fine of Rs 10,000. In addition, the offence was easily bailable. “Penalties are now severe. This should prove to be a deterrent. Enforcement is now the key,” says Ramesh Adige, president, Ranbaxy Laboratories.

Yet, the menace seems to be deep-rooted. More recently, the Drug Controller General of India (DCGI) has launched a country-wide survey of counterfeit medicines and the results are expected soon. The recent incident of Nigeria’s National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) detecting a large consignment of anti-malarial drugs from China, which had been labeled ‘Made in India’, has brought Indian drug companies under the radar. “Counterfeiting is a low-risk high returns business, making it lucrative for unscrupulous people all over the world. The problem of counterfeit medicines has done serious harm to the image of the Indian pharmaceutical industry,” says Ranjit Shahani, vice-chairman and managing director, Novartis India.

World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates that the value ascribed to counterfeit medicines across the world will reach $75 billion by the end of 2010, up by 90% since 2005. It is estimated that fake drugs account for approximately 10% of the global pharmaceuticals industry and close to 40% of the counterfeit medicines contain no active ingredients.