CATEGORY:HEALTH
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By Wallace J.A.
Inside Grenada correspondent
Thursday November 30,2006


THE WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION (WHO) estimates that about 30% of the medicines supplied in developing countries are fake. In East European countries about 10% is fake and in wealthier countries, like England, it is less than 1%.

According to Professor David Taylor of the University of London School of Pharmacy, some of the counterfeit medicines were found to contain toxic substances like anti-freeze – some in small quantities and in others, none at all.

Much of the counterfeit medication in circulation have been purchased by way of the internet, however, legitimate supply chains are not completely immune and could be penetrated. The London-based Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) – an agency which is responsible for ensuring that medicines and medical devices work, and are acceptably safe - is in the process of investigating three cases of fake treatments being supplied via a legal supply chain.

What this means for Grenada and the rest of the Caribbean is that our governments and other relevant agencies need to strengthen existing regulations to make it practically impossible for counterfeit treatment to be purchased by the peoples of the region.

This is absolutely necessary since, as the WHO statistics seem to indicate, persons who illegally make and distribute counterfeit medication tend to see developing countries as easy targets for dumping their fake treatment. Also, these countries may lack the academic sophistication and the advanced technology needed to do accurate testing on medicines entering the various territories to determine their authenticity.