Of cops and 'counterfeit' medicines
Of cops and 'counterfeit' medicines
Posted 10:44pm (Mla time) Feb 20, 2005
By Neal Cruz
Inquirer News Service
Editor's Note: Published on page A14 of the February 21, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer.
A SUSPECTED dealer in fake medicines was arrested in a buy-bust operation in San Fernando, Pampanga before the weekend, while the Department of Health revealed that 80 percent of medicines sold in drugstores and pharmacies in the Ilocos region are fake. Around P5 million worth of medicines were confiscated in San Fernando. The capsules were filled with corn starch; others were expired medicines, their expiration dates altered. Samples obtained from Ilocos drugstores contained ash and flour.
The manufacturers and distributors of fake medicines should be given long prison sentences because they put the lives and health of patients at risk. Fake medicines have long been a problem here; one reason for this is the high cost of medicines sold by multinational pharmaceutical companies. Many years ago, a notorious manufacturer of fake medicines could not be nailed by the police because he was very influential and had plenty of money to bribe officials. He had many friends in at least one morning daily and he even tried to tempt me. I was then the managing editor of the Daily Express; he came to the newsroom and introduced to me his girlfriend, a very pretty woman. One night this girlfriend came to the newsroom alone and after some small talk hinted that if I wanted a date with her I was welcome. Of course, I did not bite the bait.
That was how the guy operated and the police could not do anything with him. Until one night our police reporter called in to say that he had been killed during a high-speed car chase near Roxas Boulevard with a police team led by then Manila police chief Alfredo Lim. His case was somewhat similar to that of Don Pepe Oyson who, despite his notoriety, could not be nailed by the police. He had so many friends in the right places. Until one night he was fetched from a billiard hall by Robert Barbers, then a police detective. On the way to the Manila Police Department, inside a closed van, he allegedly grabbed a pistol and tried to escape. He was shot dead; end of the problem.
Barbers later became congressman and then senator and his chief, Lim, is now also a popular senator, proof that good cops who really fight criminality the best they can are rewarded with high office.
Why am I telling this? Because the policemen now are so different, and I miss the old days. Most policemen then were feared by criminals. When a policeman got killed, the order to every cop was: "Leave everything else; get the killer!" The cop-killer usually had less than 24 hours to live. He is often buried before the funeral of the slain cop.
These days, policemen get assassinated, but no suspects to the killings are arrested. Cops are not feared anymore-not by criminals or by drivers. As little as P50 will usually settle any traffic violation, a kindly behavior quickly learned by the traffic enforcers of the Metro Manila Development Authority. The last policeman feared, after Lim and Barbers, was Panfilo Lacson, when he was still the chief of the Philippine National Police. He is now also a senator, one more proof that good cops go places. Compare them to the present crop of policemen.
* * *
But going back to fake medicines, I notice that the word being used in the press releases and news reports is "counterfeit." By legal definition of the World Health Organization, imported genuine medicine of the same content and quality as medicines manufactured here are included in the label "counterfeit." Therefore, the word embraces the less expensive medicines imported by the Philippine government itself to give Filipinos an alternative to the high-priced medicines manufactured here by multinational companies. Filipinos are thus being frightened from buying this cheaper government imports by the propaganda campaign of the Coalition Against Fake Medicines.
I am all for informing the people about fake medicines, and the coalition should be complimented for its campaign. But its information drive is incomplete. It does not clarify that the cheaper medicines being imported and sold by the government's own Philippine International Trading Center are not fake medicines. I have written about this in two previous columns, but I have yet to read a press release or clarification on this from the coalition.
And it is not true that the DOH, supported by the Department of Trade and Industry, is the lead agency in the propaganda campaign of the coalition. The PITC is a subsidiary of the DTI. The propaganda is an initiative of multinational companies-one sells medicines, and the other manufactures all the medicines of all the foreign-owned pharmaceuticals here-and a giant drugstore chain. The DOH and DTI and the others were just invited to join the coalition. A professional public relations agency is doing the propaganda work.
Some people suspect that the sudden campaign against "counterfeit" medicines was prompted by the PITC's parallel importations of medicines which could cut into the multinationals' 80-percent hold on the Philippine drug market. The imported medicines are very much cheaper, many of them less than half of the prices of those made here. If the imported medicines are not the target of the coalition's propaganda, why is there no clarification to make everything clear, as all information campaigns should?
We should all fight fake medicines (and there is no doubt that there are many of them), but please avoid collateral damage to legitimate government imports that are meant to give Filipinos access to cheaper medicines.
Posted 10:44pm (Mla time) Feb 20, 2005
By Neal Cruz
Inquirer News Service
Editor's Note: Published on page A14 of the February 21, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer.
A SUSPECTED dealer in fake medicines was arrested in a buy-bust operation in San Fernando, Pampanga before the weekend, while the Department of Health revealed that 80 percent of medicines sold in drugstores and pharmacies in the Ilocos region are fake. Around P5 million worth of medicines were confiscated in San Fernando. The capsules were filled with corn starch; others were expired medicines, their expiration dates altered. Samples obtained from Ilocos drugstores contained ash and flour.
The manufacturers and distributors of fake medicines should be given long prison sentences because they put the lives and health of patients at risk. Fake medicines have long been a problem here; one reason for this is the high cost of medicines sold by multinational pharmaceutical companies. Many years ago, a notorious manufacturer of fake medicines could not be nailed by the police because he was very influential and had plenty of money to bribe officials. He had many friends in at least one morning daily and he even tried to tempt me. I was then the managing editor of the Daily Express; he came to the newsroom and introduced to me his girlfriend, a very pretty woman. One night this girlfriend came to the newsroom alone and after some small talk hinted that if I wanted a date with her I was welcome. Of course, I did not bite the bait.
That was how the guy operated and the police could not do anything with him. Until one night our police reporter called in to say that he had been killed during a high-speed car chase near Roxas Boulevard with a police team led by then Manila police chief Alfredo Lim. His case was somewhat similar to that of Don Pepe Oyson who, despite his notoriety, could not be nailed by the police. He had so many friends in the right places. Until one night he was fetched from a billiard hall by Robert Barbers, then a police detective. On the way to the Manila Police Department, inside a closed van, he allegedly grabbed a pistol and tried to escape. He was shot dead; end of the problem.
Barbers later became congressman and then senator and his chief, Lim, is now also a popular senator, proof that good cops who really fight criminality the best they can are rewarded with high office.
Why am I telling this? Because the policemen now are so different, and I miss the old days. Most policemen then were feared by criminals. When a policeman got killed, the order to every cop was: "Leave everything else; get the killer!" The cop-killer usually had less than 24 hours to live. He is often buried before the funeral of the slain cop.
These days, policemen get assassinated, but no suspects to the killings are arrested. Cops are not feared anymore-not by criminals or by drivers. As little as P50 will usually settle any traffic violation, a kindly behavior quickly learned by the traffic enforcers of the Metro Manila Development Authority. The last policeman feared, after Lim and Barbers, was Panfilo Lacson, when he was still the chief of the Philippine National Police. He is now also a senator, one more proof that good cops go places. Compare them to the present crop of policemen.
* * *
But going back to fake medicines, I notice that the word being used in the press releases and news reports is "counterfeit." By legal definition of the World Health Organization, imported genuine medicine of the same content and quality as medicines manufactured here are included in the label "counterfeit." Therefore, the word embraces the less expensive medicines imported by the Philippine government itself to give Filipinos an alternative to the high-priced medicines manufactured here by multinational companies. Filipinos are thus being frightened from buying this cheaper government imports by the propaganda campaign of the Coalition Against Fake Medicines.
I am all for informing the people about fake medicines, and the coalition should be complimented for its campaign. But its information drive is incomplete. It does not clarify that the cheaper medicines being imported and sold by the government's own Philippine International Trading Center are not fake medicines. I have written about this in two previous columns, but I have yet to read a press release or clarification on this from the coalition.
And it is not true that the DOH, supported by the Department of Trade and Industry, is the lead agency in the propaganda campaign of the coalition. The PITC is a subsidiary of the DTI. The propaganda is an initiative of multinational companies-one sells medicines, and the other manufactures all the medicines of all the foreign-owned pharmaceuticals here-and a giant drugstore chain. The DOH and DTI and the others were just invited to join the coalition. A professional public relations agency is doing the propaganda work.
Some people suspect that the sudden campaign against "counterfeit" medicines was prompted by the PITC's parallel importations of medicines which could cut into the multinationals' 80-percent hold on the Philippine drug market. The imported medicines are very much cheaper, many of them less than half of the prices of those made here. If the imported medicines are not the target of the coalition's propaganda, why is there no clarification to make everything clear, as all information campaigns should?
We should all fight fake medicines (and there is no doubt that there are many of them), but please avoid collateral damage to legitimate government imports that are meant to give Filipinos access to cheaper medicines.
posted by Dante at 4:31 AM
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