UK launches inquiry after news of unsafe, stolen drugs entering NHS supply chain

By PharmaCompass

2019-06-27

Impressions: 160 Article

UK launches inquiry after news of unsafe, stolen drugs entering NHS supply chain

Last week, medical authorities in the UK launched an internal inquiry after news that unsafe medicines for common conditions were stolen from Italian hospitals, sold to UK pharmacies and had potentially reached patients.

Criminal gangs linked to the mafia infiltrated the NHS supply chain in 2014, which resulted in prescription medicines for prostate cancer, epilepsy and schizophrenia being imported into the UK.

The drugs are believed to have been stolen in Italy between 2011 and 2014. More than 10,000 units had been imported into Britain by 2014, according to a Channel 4 program, Dispatches: How safe are your medicines?

The medicines were not counterfeit, but given the time they spent outside of the regulated supply chain they were classed as “falsified”. The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), which did not alert the wider public at the time, said it believed the risk to public health was low since they were legitimate medicines.

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