Friday, November 03, 2006

Fake medicines widespread in Cambodia: Media

November 03, 2006

Fake medicines are spreading throughout Cambodia, particularly in rural areas and provinces along the border with Vietnam and Thailand, bi-monthly newspaper Phnom Penh Post here on Friday quoted officials at the Ministry of Health (MoH) as saying.

So far this year, the MoH has identified 27 kinds of fake medicines, compared with 35 in 2004 and 26 in 2000, it reported.

Minister of Health Nuth Sokhom said that every country in the world has fake medicines, but he acknowledged that Cambodia has a higher proportion of fakes than other countries.

"We are worse than other countries because our people have only limited knowledge of the problem of fake medicines. There is a lack of cooperation from related organizations. The exercise of law is still weak and punishment of perpetrators too loose," he said.

In addition, Cambodia has only recently implemented measures to prevent fake medicines that other countries implemented many years ago, he added.

According to Heng Huot, director of the drug regulation bureau at the Drugs and Food Department of the MoH, most fake medicines are for everyday use such as Paracetamol and antibiotics.

They are made from flour and will neither do good nor harm if a person has a simple problem like headache, he said.

Cambodia now has 8,000 types of medicines, with 30 percent of them unregistered.

"Most of the unregistered medicines are fakes," said Huot.

Source: Xinhua

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

EVERY THING IS FAKED IN CAMBODIA1 POLICE ,ARMY, GOVERNMENT, EVEN THE PRIMISTER HIMSELF!

HUN SEN WILL KILL HIS OWN FAMILY IF THE VIET SAID SO!

Anonymous said...

The Vietcong are targeting to sell a billion dollars worth of fake products to Cambodia by then of 2007! ahahahahhahahha.

Poor Cambodian people! These Cambodian people have a salary of between 30 to 40 dollars a month and they can afford to buy fake products worth in the billion of dollars?

I just wonder if AH HUN SEN is willing to take fake money and swallow fake medicines? Hey! This bastard is blind and I don't think he know the different and he will!