Part 3. Identifying real medicines from fake ones

Given counterfeiters’ ingenuity and expertise, it is not always easy for healthcare professionals (doctors, pharmacists and others), even less so for patients, to distinguish between real medicines and fake ones.

Even if a drug is of good quality to begin with, the simple fact that it is stored and handled under inadequate conditions on the street makes it a bad drug.

Which medicines are most often counterfeited?

Anti-malarial drugs and antibiotics are among the most frequently reported substandard and falsified medicines (12% of seizures worldwide).

Overall, the WHO reports that 60% of anti-malarial medicine sold worldwide may be fake medicines and specialists estimate that if all patients received the correct medicine, the annual number of deaths could be reduced by nearly 300,000 cases/year. Resistance to anti-malarial medicines has also been observed due to the lack of appropriate medicine.

Erectile dysfunction drugs (in particular Viagra) are the most counterfeited medicine in the world (in 2010 they accounted for 57% of seizures!) as are contraceptives.

“Trendy” or highly-publicised medicines: highly-publicised medicines are subject to frequent counterfeiting. This has been the case since the beginning of 2020 for COVID-19 medicines, particularly chloroquine.

How to protect yourself?  

In Cameroon, for example, it is estimated that around 40% of medicines in circulation are fake. Healthcare professionals recommend a number of precautions for patients to reduce the risk of buying substandard medicines :

  1. Buy your medicines at a pharmacy and nowhere else,
  2. Look carefully at the packaging, appearance, and product logo. In Cameroon, the package leaflet must be in either French or English, so if you see a foreign language the medicine has definitely been smuggled.
  3. Check the manufacture and expiry dates,
  4. Compare the price with that of products you usually buy or that charged by reputable vendors. If the price is significantly lower, it could be counterfeit.

N.B.: Even though a medicine may be a good quality one, the mere fact that it is stored and handled in unsuitable conditions in the street makes it a substandard medicine.