Members of different law enforcement and intelligence agencies have identified 72 members of organised counterfeiting gangs involved in making fake and adulterated medicines of various local and foreign brands widely used in cancer and other complicated diseases, according to media reports.
The law enforcers in several drives arrested many persons from different areas of the capital and other places of the country for their alleged involvement in making fake and adulterated medicines and seized huge amount of counterfeit medicines, medicine-making machines, and medicine like original machine, empty boxes from their possessions in the past. Police and Rapid Action Battalion have also busted many factories producing counterfeit medicine in Dhaka and other parts of the country.
But, amid frequent drives, organised counterfeiting gangs in different places of the country including capital Dhaka are allegedly still producing various sophisticated and life-saving copies of the country’s bestselling medicines. They manufacture counterfeit medicines using the brand logos of different well-known, trusted and prestigious pharmaceutical companies at their underground factories.
After manufacturing, the gangs transport counterfeit medicines to different districts using some groups active in Old Dhaka’s Mitford medicine market and other wholesale located in metropolitan cities and district towns. All medicine shop owners from the country’s remote areas visit the capital’s Mitford market and other division and district level wholesale markets to purchase drugs. The organised counterfeit drug production and marketing racket use those wholesale markets as hiding places to spread fake medicine across the country. The members of organised counterfeiting gangs are now actively distributing counterfeit medicines targeting the small-town pharmacies, police say.
The government should
protect people’s health
and prevent adulterated
medicines
These counterfeit medicines are being sold in the market at a much lower price than the real ones. Apart from counterfeit drugs, the organised syndicates are also flooding the country’s markets with consignments of expired, unregistered, banned, sex enhancers and life-endangering medicines, putting the lives of people especially those who live in remote villages at risk.
Medicines are used to save lives but if people take counterfeit, expired, unregistered and banned ones they may face the instant consequence and even death. People take medicine when they get sick but they get sicker and sicker by taking these counterfeit drugs. The rural people and even the urban customers cannot identify the fake drugs. Every year many people die taking counterfeit medicines in our country due to lack of strict vigilance.
So, the unholy nexus has been counterfeiting expensive and widely-used medicines of various renowned brands and lifesaving drugs of cancer and diabetes. Bangladesh is currently exporting medicines to 145 countries and such counterfeiting tarnishes the image of the industry.
The drug administration must take action against the manufacturers of these counterfeit drugs immediately as non-pharmaceutical grade chemicals can cause serious damage to the kidneys, liver and heart. These counterfeit drugs are a death trap for the common people. So, such practice should not be tolerated any more. Therefore, the government should get tough on counterfeiting gangs involved in copying and manufacturing medicines. The ‘Drugs and Cosmetics Bill, 2023’ previously titled as the ‘Drugs Bill, 2022’ was passed in Parliament in September providing for penalty of Tk 20,000 to life-term for different offences.
So, the government will have to bring the production, import, marketing and sale of cosmetics under the drugs law in the wake of allegations that fake and adulterated cosmetics have flooded the country’s market, having injurious effects on public health. We think the government should protect people’s health and prevent adulterated medicines.