Counterfeit drugs sales run rampant
Hanoi's Drug Administration hosted the event in conjunction with the Ministry of Health and similar agencies from Laos, Cambodia, France and Thailand. It was found that a large amount of fake or low-quality drugs have been sold and recalled.
Not only fake forms of common drugs, such as Tanganil, for the treatment of vertigo, Mobic tablets for the short-term treatment of painful osteoarthritis are illegally made, but other specialised drugs such as Vastarel, for chest pain and Dogmatil, mental imbalances, have been on the market.
Colonel Long Sreng, Chief of the Interior Ministry's economic police unit said that they just seized 22 tonnes of fake drugs and 516 tonnes of extremely low-quality foods being prepared for transfer into Vietnam. According to Cambodian police, many of these products originated from China and were meant to go through Vietnam en route to Cambodia.
Currently many people buy Viagra over the internet, not knowing that most of these drugs are fake. The WHO has reported that about 2.5 million people in Europe are using fake Viagra. The organisation further said fake drugs make up about 10% of the world's market.
The Vietnam National Institute of Drug Quality Control said that in 2011, they discovered 31 different kinds being sold. After 48,261 drug samples were sent for testing 940 did not meet the standards.
According to regulations, after the discovery of low quality medication, the Vietnam Drug Administration or the local department of health must immediately issue a ban on that drug on hospitals, pharmacies and enterprises to purchase them. But the system has been slow in action and many of these drugs slipped through the cracks.
Ph.D Truong Quoc Cuong, head of Vietnam Drug Administration said all of the drugs imported to Vietnam are regularly checked and will be recalled if they are found to be unsafe. However, he said, it is hard to control all the new types of drugs on the market, since many of the bad effects are not known until patients have experienced them.
