How do you test whether a medication is legitimate?

Infographic showing how medication is tested.

Testing medicine for legitimacy is a complicated process. Across 24 different prescription medicines, the average cost to test a single dose is $2,750. However, ensuring that a batch of 100 pills is safe requires testing at least 22 pills. To learn more about this topic, read PSM’s summary: safedr.ug/Acri-Explained.

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Myth: We are getting the same drugs Canadians take

In 2014, during a two-year period when Maine was experimenting with drug importation, the president of Maine’s Pharmacy Association purchased medications from an online pharmacy for testing. The drugs he received were not approved for the Canadian or U.S. markets. Worse, they were poor quality: two of them were the wrong strength, and the other was contaminated.

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Do You Know What A Pill Press Is?

Do you know what a pill press is? Drug counterfeiters can acquire a pill press and a counterfeit pill mold to churn out counterfeit medications for less than $500. Unfortunately, “garage manufacturers” are not careful about manufacturing controls, and their products often contain fatal doses of fentanyl or other drugs. Since 2015, bootleg prescription drugs…

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Bipartisan Safety Issues: How Many Different Kinds of Black Market Medicines have been Sold in Your State?

Since 2012, the FDA has issued warnings to more than 3,000 doctors, clinics and hospitals about eight different breaches in the U.S. drug supply chain by rogue distributors such as Richards Pharma, Canada Drugs, Medical Device King, Gallant Pharmaceuticals, and TC Medical. These rogue distributors offered 63 different non-FDA approved medicines. Have you or has someone you know taken medicine that these smugglers have sold?

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Black Market Injectable Cosmetic Treatments, a Nationwide Problem

Between 2005 and 2013, there was one death and 11 other patients who required medical attention for disfigurement or serious illness as the result of receiving fake or misbranded cosmetic injectables while at a doctor’s office, clinic, or salon. Black Market Cosmetic Injectables in the U.S. 2005-2013 attempts to describe the scope of the problem.

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