Control of Spread of Counterfeit Medicines by Foreign Terrorist Organizations and Transnational Criminal Organizations

The control of the new transnational crime industry of counterfeiting medicines by foreign terrorist organizations and transnational criminal organizations cost the interantional community over $438,000,000 and increase the rate of superbugs that are antibacterial anti viral resistant

Control of Spread of Counterfeit Medicines
As technology evolves so do the opportunities for transnational criminal organizations. One of the new crimes being committed is the marketing of counterfeit medicines. "Major international organized crime groups have become more global in theri reach, diversifying into increasingly sophisticated cyber and financial crimes. This is indicated by the 2009 Report on from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. The report amongst several others indicates a stream of counterfeit drugs is making its way out of India and China. Unless responsible members of the international community step forward to stop the problem then the creation of super bugs like methylcylin resistant staphococus will increase in variety and frequency. Current markets are cited as Nigeria Guinea and Guinea Bissau. Annually this amounts to a cost of 438 million United States Dollars. Most of the counterfeit medication includes anti-malarial medicine, antibiotics, anti-tuberculosis drugs, and anti-retrovirals (ARVs) Dora Akunyyily former Director General of National Agency of Food and Drug Administration Control of Nigeria states that frequently there are no active ingredients in the drugs at all. They are smuggled out of South East Asia where counterfeiting of drugs is a civil offense. Evidence of organized criminal networks including Al Quaeda cells as documented by INTERPOL is being reported in much of the transnational crime monitoring publications. In addition to counterfeiting, hijackings of pharmaceuticals such as anti malarial drugs are done and the expiration date is extended. Affected drugs are Chloroquine, sulphadoxine-pyrimethamine, halofantrine, co-trimoxazole, Amoxycillin, Ampicillin, Ciprofloxacin, erythromycin, Gentamicin, Metronidazole, Tetracycline, Cefalexin, Lincomycin, Oxtetracyclin. Forty eight percent of medicines in Wes t Africa are out of specification. Drugs combating malaria are frequent targets as well as HIV and Tuberculosis. With 97,445,726 cases of malaria in 2008 the importance of good drugs to control Malaria is obvious.
The United States May aid in the control of this new transnational organized crime endeavor by becoming aware of and devoting resource to combat this problem in countries that have United States Interest,. As the program become established then The State Department has a mechanism to provide international cross training to affected states as the State Department deems needed.

Who is perpetrating such an irresponsible crime? According to the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement many groups have so entrenched themselves in so many crimes that they cannot longer be identified by one type of crimes such as narco trafficking. In addition to transnational criminal organizations are the FTOs or Foreign Terrorist Organizations Transnational Crime groups and FTOS tend to create what the State Department has called "IronTrinagles" where corrupt government officials, business leaders, and organized crime groups work together to circumvent public policy. Involvement of Iron triangles probably is occurring as many of the distributions anti-malarial drugs are done through NGOs which are filled with such forces. The State Department mentions many crimes and all are worthy and the reading of the references may sober up the readers, however production and distribution of pharmaceuticals is not mentioned. Interpol however has made arrest on 29 May 2009 under the umbrellas organization World Health Impact International Products Anti Counterfeiting Task Force (IMPACT) six arrests were made each resulting worth hundreds of millions of dollars. IMPACT has been working with the Permanent Forum in International Pharmaceutical Crime which have included Operation Storm in Cambodia. Recognition of this new type of Crime by The United States over the next 15 years can increase the world wide health and decrease the risk of new superbugs which will adversely affect the health of The World.
Policy recommendations:
? The U.S. and other donors should fully fund the UN security force for acquiring and distributing aid.
? The U.S. should provide $1 million in funding over five years to the control of Distribution of Counterfeit pharmaceuticals.
? The U.S. should push for a permanent presence of an representative in Nigeria to monitor cases of suspected cases.
? The U.S. and the UN should work with various government officials on a legislative framework for national pharmaceutical drug counterfeiting policies in the affected areas.