Today, approximately 1.5 million counterfeit medicine packs enter the legal supply chain each year — in other words, one pack in every 20000 is counterfeit. What is more worrying, however, is the rate at which this is increasing. Between now and 2020, the spread of counterfeit drugs is estimated to rise to either an 'optimistic' 19.5 million or a pessimistic 192 million packs in the legal supply chain.

We have the technology...

According to the EU Commission consultation on combating counterfeiting medicines for human use, released in December 2008, the annual direct and indirect societal costs of counterfeiting are approximately €950 million. The overall costs of inaction will reach €9.5 billion–€116 billion by 2020, and this does not take into account the intangible yet significant damage to brand reputation and trust. The proposal also highlighted the worrying change in the type of medicines that are now being counterfeited: there has been a distinct shift during the last few years from lifestyle medicines to prescription medicines such as oncology treatments and antidepressants; even generic and overthecounter (OTC) products are no longer immune.

Mass serialization

Mass serialization is the method of adding machinereadable codes containing a serial number to individual packs of medicines. Unlike all other methods for verifying drugs, it enables product authentication at the point of dispense (POD) and provides the ultimate barrier between potentially harmful drugs and the patient, while offering the pharmaceutical industry a myriad of benefits.

Rules for optimal secure coding