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EU Pharma Loses Over €10bn a Year to Counterfeit Medicines

on Tuesday, 25 October 2016.

The pharmaceutical industry in the European Union is losing €10.2bn a year, or 4.4% of sales, due to counterfeit medicines.

These figures have come from the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO).

This equates to 38,000 lost jobs in the pharma sector and a further 53,000 jobs lost in other sectors as a knock-on effect. Government revenue is down €1.7bn due to lost corporation and income taxes.

Other than just the significant economic effects, worse still - as EUIPO director Antonia Campinos has pointed out - fake medicines can be toxic and pose a serious danger to health. This can be a problem from inexpensive pain relief treatments through to life-threatening cancer treatments.

The EUIPO report estimates that €600m is lost per year in the UK due to counterfeit medicines, with 2,900 jobs lost.

Many people believe that this is just the tip of the iceberg and the problem is a lot bigger than those counterfeit medicines that are known about.

Falsified medicines clearly remains a serious issue and that is why the full implementation of the EU's Falsified Medicines Directive by 2019 is so important.


For more information, please contact Paul Gershlick on 01923 919 320.