INTERPOL - World Model United Nations

Canada, and the United States. 115 ough cooperative in
nature, the PFIPC is slow-moving since it performs its
actions based on consensus, and several countervailing
political opinions come into play.
In the United States, the FDA has created a Counterfeit
Drug Taskforce in response to the rise in reports of
counterfeiting in pharmaceuticals. It has the stated goal
of “preventing the introduction of counterfeit drugs,
facilitating the identication of counterfeit drugs,
minimizing risk and exposure of consumers to counterfeit
drugs, and avoiding the addition of unnecessary costs on
the prescription drug distribution system, or unnecessary
restrictions to lower-cost sources of drugs.” 116 e FDA does
not believe that counterfeit drugs are rampant in the United
States, but it does acknowledge that there has recently
been a dramatic increase. 117 e Counterfeit Drug Task
Force identies vulnerabilities in the US drug distribution
system and develops ways to counteract these aws. Task
force strategies for combating drug counterfeiting include
using advanced technology, securing business practices and
regulatory requirements, creating rapid alert and response
systems, developing education and public awareness
programs, and addressing international issues. 118
POTENTIAL VOTING BLOCS
In most industrialized countries with eective regulatory
systems and market control (such as Australia, Canada,
Japan, New Zealand, most of the European Union, and
the United States), incidences of counterfeit medicine
tend to be less than 1% of market value, according to these
countries’ estimates. 119 is number jumps to an estimated
8% of bulk drugs in the United States, according to the
American Pharmacists’ Association. 120 Despite this low
number, counterfeiting has been on a rise in these nations.
us, there will be a focus on regulating and shutting
down various websites selling counterfeit drugs. ese
countries will be receiving plenty of pressure from large
pharmaceutical companies based in their states to focus on
regulation stemming from the public and governments.
In many African countries and in parts of Asia, Latin
America, and countries in transition, a much higher
proportion of up to 50% of medicines may be counterfeit.
For example, in Cambodia, 60% of 133 drug vendors
were found to be selling anti-malaria medications
lacking the active ingredient. irty-eight percent
of the anti-malarial artesunate in Southeast Asia has
been documented to be counterfeit. 121 is proportion
varies signicantly in each country, as well as between
urban and rural populations. 122 is can be attributed both
to weaker regulatory systems as well as a larger market
of chronically ill, uneducated, and impoverished patients
who are more likely than their educated or wealthier
counterparts to seek counterfeit medicines, which tend to
be cheaper. ese countries will tend to focus on the need
to change overall pharmaceutical prices, which they argue
are unaordable to their population due to various patent
laws. Countries such as Brazil and India are particularly
vocal about this issue; they argue that patent laws make it
increasingly dicult to produce mass-made generic drugs
that are just as eective as name-brand drugs, but nearly
half as expensive. ey blame pharmaceutical companies
for using the ght against counterfeit pharmaceuticals
as merely a cover for the squashing of competitors that
produce generic drugs at low cost. As Maria Nazareth
Farani Azevedo, Brazil’s ambassador to the WHO, stated
at the World Health Assembly in Geneva, Switzerland
(May 2010): “What we object to is a group of private
companies, with the help of the WHO secretariat, waging
war in this organisation against generic medicines.” 123
Berne Declaration NGO’s head of health projects Patrick
Durish elaborates: “Emerging and developing countries
believe there is a readiness to reinforce intellectual property
laws and the monopolies of the pharmaceutical industry
under the guise of the ght against counterfeits.” 124 us,
developing countries will be the ones attempting to pressure
pharmaceutical companies through INTERPOL rather than
being inuenced by the companies’ wishes in the interest of
reducing life-threatening diseases in their country through
the provision of low-cost generic drugs.
SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER RESEARCH
For further information about counterfeit
pharmaceuticals, the rst resource to consider is the
INTERPOL Pharmaceutical Crime Department, which
describes INTERPOL’s role and lists several news articles
relevant to the issue: http://www.interpol.int/Public/
PharmaceuticalCrime/Default.asp.
Further research materials can be found on the websites of
all the key actors, listed above:
!" WHO: www.who.int
!" PSI: www.psi-inc.org
!" PFIPC: www.ppc.org
!" FDA: www.fda.gov
Valuable academic and online journals dealing with health
issues with free online content include Journal of the
Harvard WorldMUN 2012 INTERPOL 26