Illicit drug circulation alarming: Group

The Jakarta Post , Jakarta | Fri, 04/25/2008 12:27 PM | Headlines

Circulation of illegal medicines has reached alarming levels in the country, threatening both consumers and the pharmaceutical industries, according to an industry group.

Presenting an estimate by the World Health Organization, Thierry Powis of International Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Group (IPMG) said about 10 percent of traded medicines here were either illegally distributed or fake.

"The government so far has acknowledged about 1 to 1.5 percent," Powis said.

Inadequate legal infrastructure and weak law enforcement here, he said, fostered the problem.

"The total losses suffered by the state in terms of taxes could go beyond Rp 600 billion (US$65.4 million) in a year," he said, citing a conclusion of a study by the University of Indonesia's Institute for Economic and Social Research in 2005

To overcome the problem, he said, pharmaceutical companies have taken extra measures such as developing difficult-to-imitate packaging, including the use of holograms and radio frequency labels.

However, he said the most effective preventative measure was to educate people about the dangers of using fake products.

That is why IPMG plans to take the message to the public by, among other things, holding awareness-raising seminars on illegal medicines.

"The most expensive and dangerous medicine is the one that does not work. It does not only cost us money, but also our lives," Powis said.

Justisiari Perdana Kusumah from the Indonesian Anti-Counterfeiting Society said illegal medicines were those that were produced by unauthorized companies; those whose ingredients were not 100 percent the same as their official registration licenses; and those that were not procured properly.

Illegal medicines found in markets, he said, range from regularly consumed medications such as anti-influenza pills to lifestyle drugs such as weight-loss drugs and Viagra.

"Indonesia actually has several laws to prosecute drug counterfeiters, including the Criminal Code, the law on brand names and the law on health. However, they tend to conflict with each other and the enforcement is very weak," he said.

He said the producers and distributors of fake drugs could be jailed for 15 years under the current laws, but people were rarely sentenced to anything longer than one year.

"A tougher law to end the widespread distribution of fake medicines in Indonesia is currently being deliberated in the House of Representatives," he said. (uwi)

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