the problem with fake drugs

here in Asia, we have a problem with fake and counterfeit drugs.

You often get substandard cheap generic drugs, but the real danger is fake or substandard dosages if you don't pay extra for brand name drugs. But the poor often can't afford the brand names, so essentially are playing Russian Roulette when they buy cheap generics.

The government here tries to stop the obvious problems but doesn't always catch them in time.

World Health Organization memo:

Key facts

• Substandard and falsified medical products may cause harm to patients and fail to treat the diseases for which they were intended.
• They lead to loss of confidence in medicines, healthcare providers and health systems.
• They affect every region of the world.
• Substandard and falsified medical products from all main therapeutic categories have been reported to WHO including medicines, vaccines and in vitro diagnostics.
• Anti-malarials and antibiotics are amongst the most commonly reported substandard and falsified medical products.
• Both generic and innovator medicines can be falsified, ranging from very expensive products for cancer to very inexpensive products for treatment of pain.
• They can be found in illegal street markets, via unregulated websites through to pharmacies, clinics and hospitals.
• An estimated 1 in 10 medical products in low- and middle-income countries is substandard or falsified.
• Substandard and falsified medical products contribute to antimicrobial resistance and drug-resistant infections.

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the WHO article goes into detail the various ways drugs are diluted with fake ingredients or manufactured in a substandard way or sold looking like the real medicine but is counterfeit.

and now there is a major problem with contamination of a popular blood pressure medicine.

From the UKMail:

The impurities found in some of the most in-demand medications for heart failure and hypertension are a byproduct that emerge when certain active ingredients are mixed together. If the drugs are made according to the 'recipe', there shouldn't be a risk of this byproduct occurring.

The problem, experts say, is that the supplier in Linhai, China, Zhejiang Huahai Pharmaceutical Co, may not have been cleaning up after itself, or failing to invest in tools to screen for these contaminants.

As shortages blight the US, Europe, and even India (which is the second-biggest drug maker after China), it's becoming ominously clear that most of the world relies heavily on China, without having much power to control, inspect or coordinate on quality.

 so blame Trumpie boy for cutting back the FDA? Not really: because this problem dates back years.

'I think the FDA is losing leverage over China in terms of inspection,' Rosemary Gibson, co-author of China Rx, told DailyMail.com, referring to the months-long ordeal the agency had trying to get visas for its inspectors to enter the country in 2014 and 2015. 'They [China] want to make it hard for the FDA to do its job. 

Why do we allow that?' But Gibson says that the FDA should not become the scapegoat of this story. We need to look at how China was permitted to hold so much sway over the world's drug supplies, and analyze all the gatekeepers that are able to shift that pendulum. ...

some of this is costs cutting, because following all those dang rules for quality control costs money. Better to pretend you do it by faking the paper work and pocket the money.

but there also have been major scandals in China because cheap, often toxic ingredients are placed into the drugs, baby formula or dog food, because the toxic ingredient was cheaper  or would mimic the real thing in ordinary quality control testing