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The counterfeiters are going to face yet another blow, as the pharmaceutical technology companies are gearing up to launch one more offensive against them with new platforms and stricter laws. The industry players revealed that further hurdles will be posed in the way of the counterfeiters to interrupt the ease with which they manufacture counterfeit drugs and enter the market.
Bilcare Technologies has come up with a device that will trace the fake drugs and Ideal Cures has made its tablets more colorful which will make counterfeiting difficult. Counterfeit drugs affect the revenue generation of the manufacturers and also cause serious health complications in the consumers to such an extent that they can even lose their lives.
Bilcare Technologies, a technology division of Bilcare Research based in Pune, will soon introduce a hand-held gadget to help trace the counterfeit drugs. Developed after a non-clonable technology, the tailor-made gadget will be kept at chemist stores for consumers to examine an item to see if it’s fake.
Bilcare Research’s executive director Praful Naik said, “The product has gone through rigorous pilots and could be launched in a few months. Pilots already conducted have given a good response and pharma companies are enthused about the product”.
According to company sources, the device that has not been given any name yet would cost about $100 (around Rs 5,000). The device will examine an item for a tamper-evident, non-clonable tag. The company stated that as the fingerprints on the tag is created in a random fashion, it is hard to copy.
The tag can be added in any sort of packaging and fixed with communication platforms. This tag will be scanned with the help of a propriety reading device that will send an encoded image through a universal mobility platform to a protected server, rendering authentication and tracing of an item possible.
It is claimed that this kind of product will help control the further penetration of counterfeit drugs into the domestic market, which according to analysts is already flooded with 30% of such stock. According to the estimates provided by World Health Organisation (WHO) the production of fake drugs all over the world is expected to touch $75 billion the end of 2010, which is an increase of 90% from 2005 levels.
Multi-color tablet coating by tablet-coating firm Ideal Cures is considered to be another technology-driven innovation that would help scan fake drugs. Managing director of Ideal Cures Suresh Pareek told, “It is easy for counterfeiters to duplicate both packaging and colour of an original product. But, at present, all tablets are only single-colour. Multi-colour coating is more complex to copy”.
The company says it has registered many patent applications for the technology and it can be added into the manufacturing process of any pharmaceutical company with ease.
The modified Drugs and Cosmetics Act pronounces stringent punishment for companies involved in producing adulterated or fake drugs. Under the new law, one needs to provide concrete evidence of both adulteration and production of fake drugs for an alleged person to be punished.
To check counterfeiting practices, the law has extended the term of punishment for the offence to 10 years captivity from 5 years, and it can further be extended to life term too. The penalty charges have also been raised from Rs 10,000 to Rs 1 lakh.
Nevertheless, innovative methods also fail to free nation of spurious drugs. The new technologies that are developed to check counterfeit drugs pose a challenge for them only for a small period of time, till they purchase the innovative device used by pharmaceutical companies and render it impossible for a common man to spot a spurious drug.
Chairman and managing director of Novartis and President of the Organisation of Pharmaceutical Producers of India (OPPI), Ranjit Shahani says, “Counterfeiters are only six months behind us. While these technologies won’t put them out of business, they certainly will slow them down. Combined with new legislation and whistleblower policy, it will be more difficult for counterfeit drugs to find their way into the market”. According to him, the main challenge is to synchronize the work of the several agencies and stakeholders. The Economic Times
October 9, 2009
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