Falsified Medicines: EC Report Finds Inconsistent Penalties Throughout the EU

A recent European Commission (EC) report shows that although all EU Member States have implemented laws in accordance with the Falsified Medicines Directive, sanctions for violating these laws vary considerably from one country to another. country to another.

"Sanctions are only effective if they are properly implemented and I urge all EU countries to ensure that criminals who falsify drugs are punished," said Vytenis Andriukaitis, European Commissioner for Health and food security. ensure that criminals catch counterfeit drugs are punished.

According to the report, the maximum imprisonment penalty for falsifying a drug of only one year varies between Sweden, Finland and Greece at age 15 in Austria, Slovenia and Slovakia.

The maximum penalties for the counterfeiting of a medicine range from € 4,300 in Lithuania to € 1 million in Spain. In the United Kingdom, there is no maximum for such fines.

Similarly, maximum prison sentences and misconduct penalties for active substances and excipients vary considerably from one Member State to another.

In addition, the specification differs from what has been criminalized from one Member State to another. For example, Latvia sanctions drug falsification resulting in bodily injury or death, while most Member States criminalize falsification "without the need to prove that the product is dangerous to health" .

The report also notes that it is "difficult to measure the effectiveness of specific national sanctions because of a lack of comprehensive data on incidents in the Member States".

However, experts consulted before the report told the EC that the sanctions "had at least one effect on reducing the presence of counterfeit drugs in the legal distribution chain," but described the administrative sanctions as the most effective deterrent.

But with regard to the sale of illegal drugs, the experts found that criminal sanctions were a more effective deterrent.

As such, the report recommends that Member States introduce additional administrative and criminal penalties for falsified medicines and request countries to reserve sufficient resources to maintain these sanctions.