Medications made by criminals are not subjected to any form of clinical control

The one time President of France Jacques Chirac is fronting a campaign to rid the world and especially Africa of the plague of counterfeit drugs that kill and injure tens of thousands of people annually. The World Health Organisation statistics show that around 10% of all medicines sold in the world are fake with a value of almost $70 billion and that the third world gets the brunt of them.

The Fondation Chirac which President Chirac set up soon after leaving office has committed considerable time and resources to fighting this problem and he will be urging African leaders to legislate and enforce existing anti counterfeiting laws. He explained that in some parts of Africa as many as 70% of all medicines are fake and therefore are substandard or even dangerous.

The other point President Chirac made which we have harped on about at Ukmedix News more than once is that the profits made by the criminal organisations who manufacture these counterfeit medications are mind-boggling and are used to finance a whole range of other criminal activities. President Chirac said that the scale of the money involved could soon become bigger than legitimate drug trade worldwide.

Part of the problem is the popularity of fake Viagra tablets which are extremely cheap to produce and which sell not only in third world countries but also in America and Europe online. We have stressed repeatedly at Ukmedix News that when you buy fake Viagra tablets online you are likely to be financing a criminal operation producing other counterfeit drugs which could end up killing innocent civilians.

The World Health Organisation estimates conservatively that as many as 200,000 individuals may be saved if counterfeit medications were prevented from reaching the market. A couple of cases such as when 300 people died in Panama and when 100 babies died in Nigeria are just a small indicator of the problem.

Medications made by criminals are not subjected to any form of clinical control and you have no comeback if you get sick as a result. Buying counterfeit Viagra online may seem to be a good idea because of the cheap price but not only could you get sick but you may also be contributing to the death of an innocent civilian in Africa.

Ukmedix News wishes President Chirac the best of luck with his venture and hopes that his initiative will produce results.