Fake online pharmacies offer counterfeiters an unparalleled means of selling falsified medicines. Most efforts focus on taking down websites but Eli Lilly wants law enforcement to go back through the illegal supply chain to find the source and stop it from distributing fake drugs.
“More effort is needed through investigations to track websites back to the source. Dismantling these counterfeit pharmaceutical networks must become a higher priority for law enforcement globally”, said Michael Russo, director of global security, product and asset protection at Eli Lilly.
Stopping the supply of counterfeit medicines at the source is one element of Lilly’s preferred plan for tackling fake online pharmacies. Action by companies that indirectly support fake pharmacies is another part of the strategy.
“[Stopping fake pharmacies] will undoubtedly require more active support from the private sector companies that are indirectly facilitating the registration and advertisement of new sites every day as well as processing and shipping the purchased fake and illegal medicines”, said Russo.
Stopping services
Voluntary initiatives are already underway, with Google and Go Daddy setting up the non-profit Center for Safe Internet Pharmacies (CSIP). The centre brings together search engines, credit card companies, shippers and more to stop businesses providing services to fake pharmacies.
To prosper CSIP needs governmental support, said Russo. Specifically, the House should adopt a bill to give “legal immunity to CSIP and other Internet-related companies who stop providing services to websites that endanger the public health”.
Russo was speaking at a hearing of the US House Committee on Homeland Security . In his testimony Russo outlined current anti-counterfeiting strategies and other measures Lilly wants to see implemented.
2 comments (Comments are now closed)
Stopping Counterfeits is nice in Theory, however...
What Eli-Lilly fails to state is that they also want to stop the flow of perfectly legal Eli-Lilly products from the UK, the EU and other parts of Latin America of which American patients are now sourcing daily. Which one can't blame the patient as the prices outside the states are so much lower.
That is what Eli-Lilly will also try to group together...
Regards,
Dr. Gp., MD.,
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Posted by Dr. Gp MD.,
13 July 2011 | 05h31
Dramatizing the dangers of illicit drug trafficking
I have written a fictional novel that illuminates illicit drug infiltration into our hospitals. while it deals with issues of hospital politics ,medical mistakes and medeical bravery, it's of interest that book editors while approving of the writing, are not interested in the topic. This issue needs more public penetration
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Posted by Richard A. Berjian, D.O.
12 July 2011 | 15h04