Daily Newsletter

01 November 2023

Daily Newsletter

01 November 2023

UK seizes illegal medicines and devices worth over £84m in last 15 years

As per WHO, about one in ten medical products in low-income and middle-income countries is substandard or falsified.

Phalguni Deswal November 01 2023

The UK Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) celebrated 15 years since the launch of Operation Pangea by providing UK statistics from the programme.

The news of counterfeit Ozempic (semaglutide) pens has raised alarms over the last few months with the manufacturer, Novo Nordisk, and multiple countries reporting the harms of these products along with highlighting the differences in the packaging of the fake products, compared to the original.

Operation Pangea is coordinated by Interpol with support from multiple global organisations including the World Customs Organization, the World Health Organization (WHO), the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, the International Narcotics Control Board, and national health regulatory agencies.

The agency stated that the MHRA’s Criminal Enforcement Unit (CEU) has seized over 25 million illegally traded medicines and devices in the UK, which are valued at more than £84m ($101.9m) in the past 15 years. Furthermore, the agency seized illegal medicines worth £5m in 2023.

Operation Pangea XVI, which ran from 3-10 October, led to the seizure of medications worth $7m, as per Interpol. Most seized medications globally were erectile dysfunction medications. The biggest medical device seizure was the confiscation of approximately 11,000 Covid-19 irregular test kits in Australia.

Counterfeit Covid-19 medical devices have been an ongoing issue before, with the previous iteration of Operation Pangea (Operation Pangea XIII) seizing some 37,000 counterfeit medical devices in 2021. As per WHO, approximately one in ten medical products in low-income and middle-income countries is substandard or falsified.

There has been a 35% drop in the Covid-19 nucleic acid amplification tests (NAATs) market value in the US, as per GlobalData’s Covid-19 tests market model.

Is the healthcare industry ready to fully embrace the benefits of digitalization and AI?

The healthcare, pharma, and medical devices industries are often risk-averse compared to other sectors when adopting new technologies. However, mainly due to COVID-19, these sectors have witnessed an acceleration in digital transformation. AI can revolutionize the drug discovery process and significantly reduce the time and cost to get a drug to market, particularly in areas of unmet need. There is also huge potential for AI in medical diagnostics. However, using healthcare data for AI development raises data privacy concerns, thereby limiting its adoption.

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