ABSTRACT
Pharmaceutical drugs are essential for the maintenance of good health and longevity. China’s research and development-based Pharmaceutical Association estimates that about 8% of China’s over-the-counter drugs are counterfeit. In 2016, 20 suspects were detained in China’s eastern provinces, and almost 20,000 boxes of fake drugs and several tons of raw materials were seized by police in Huzhou, Zhejiang. Like most counterfeit industries that offer goods for sale, counterfeit drugs have their own manufacturing process and marketing strategies. Cancer drugs were then the eighth most popular counterfeit drugs, according to the Pharmaceutical Security Institute. In 2009, the China Food and Drug Administration Bureau announced that the China State Council approved the establishment of an inter-ministry task force to combat counterfeit drugs. The interconnectedness of illicit manufacturing systems takes advantage of an increasingly globalized drug market posing a threat to global health and security.
