USP Building Database to Track Fake Meds

The U. S. Pharmacopeia (USP) is building a database of fake medications to support and share with regulators and non-governmental organizations targeted to launch in 2011. The database will provide regulators with the ability to monitor fake and substandard drug trends and better support enforcement actions.

Patrick Lukulay, director of the Promoting the Quality of Medicines (PQM) program at USP spoke with Nick Taylor of In-Pharma Technologist.com at the American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists Annual Meeting and Exposition in New Orleans on November 16.

Taylor reports that Lukulay said the database will allow international action for counterfeit drug smugglers, for example, providing data to regulators in Mali on drugs some of which had been previously seized in Ghana. The initial step was the development of the database architecture, and now USP is inputting information about fake and substandard drugs into the database. The database will contain the name of the product, country of seizure, description and deficiencies.

Lukulay also told Taylor that USP is seeing real enforcement progress in developing nations, such as Ghana and Cambodia, supported by USP’s technical support and training. Ultimately, Lukulay told Taylor, country capacity building for self-regulation is the goal.