Warning over fake cancer drugs on web
Print Edition
THREE-quarters of imported cancer-fighting drugs sold online are fakes, China’s State Food and Drug Administration warned yesterday.
Bogus medicines delay genuine treatment and themselves cause health problems, said the FDA in an alert on the risks of buying medication online.
“All countries have strict regulations on prescribed medicines, which can’t be purchased from official channels without a doctor’s prescription,” the notice said.
“Websites claiming they can buy cancer medicines from other countries should be treated with suspicion.”
In any case, the FDA reminded online shoppers, only 184 drugstores are licensed to sell medicines online — and only over-the-counter treatments.
No online retailer can sell prescription drugs nor any products containing ephedrine — a decongestant that can also be used to make the drug methamphetamine, or “ice.”
Ephedrine treatments can be sold in drug stores but buyers must show identity cards.
There is a big market for imported cancer treatments, partly because the price in China’s mainland is expensive.
The marketing of cancer lags behind Western countries as pharmaceutical giants usually first market drugs in the United States and Europe.
The approval of a marketed medicine in the mainland is also a complicated procedure.
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