Singapore, October 2, 2009: To overcome the counterfeiting of pharmaceutical products, Col. Arturo G. Vidad, President, Asian Anti-counterfeiting Association (AAA), Philippine Chapter has recommended AAA to establish fixed AAA coordinating center to serve as a centralized depository of information and database among the association members.

 

Speaking on “Counterfeiting and Anti-counterfeiting Operations in the Philippine Pharmaceutical Industry” at the ‘Safety & Security Asia 2009’ in Singapore, Col. Arturo G. Vidad, observed the need for an AAA website to help in information drive and to encourage exchanges of information among member countries and also to disseminate information and educate the members with Anti-counterfeiting enforcement policies in other member countries.

 

Too long and cumbersome legal processes, weak punishment, information leakage of pending operations, conservative corporate policy regarding publicity, time constraints, expensive to undertake operations against counterfeiters are some of the issues that still to get the attention of the industry. To address these Col. Arturo G. Vidad, suggested to strengthen coordination among all chapters of AAA and encourage taking up Certification Programs such as CFI, etc.

 

Quoting Dr. Harvey Bale Jr, Director General of the Geneva-based International Federation of Pharma Manufacturers Associations (IFPMA), he said, “Trafficking in counterfeit medicines is a $3 -$5 billion industry. And as the price of genuine drugs continue to climb; the problem is bound to increase, too. The problems are proliferating partly because drug companies are not keen to talk about the problem. “The consumers in Southeast Asia have 1 in 10 chances of buying a counterfeit medicine and in mainland China; consumers have 50-50 chance of buying a counterfeit medicine. For top selling drugs, fakes are outnumbering the originals by 8 to 1,” he added.