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In a bid to protect the made in India brand in the pharmaceutical space, PharmaSecure has received encouraging response from the Indian drug companies for its anti-counterfeit solutions of tracking and tracing medicines ahead of the Government deadline of July 1, 2011.
As per the notification issued by the Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT), all exports of pharmaceutical products from India have to mandatorily comply with these anti-counterfeit measures from the said date.
Advantages of the SMS based authentication service is that it cost per strip is lower than hologram price, for the SMS based authentication. It costs few paise, whereas with higher volume cost will further reduce.
The Government mandated track and trace solution for export drugs can be implemented in phases. Phase 1 would cost few paise per strip similar to the SMS based service. Phase-1 would include serialisation of every primary/secondary/tertiary package as per GS1 standard and authenticity of the medicine can be checked anywhere in the world, through Web. The subsequent phases of a full track and trace solution are primarily for supply chain management and the cost would depend on how elaborate the implementation is.
The $ 20 billion (Rs.90,000 crore) Indian pharmaceutical industry constitutes 40 per cent exports, it accounts for the third largest drug production globally by volume and 14th by value, has increasingly witnessed spurious and counterfeit drugs made in China for African countries, under the brand name of Indian drug companies.
Companies like Lupin, Unichem Laboratories and MSN Laboratories have already implemented these solutions from PharmaSecure for some of their products, which enable the patient to ensure authenticity of the drug by sending an SMS and getting immediate response. The mobile number and unique ID of the drug are printed on the package during manufacturing process. PharmaSecure is offering complete track and trace solution for phase wise deployment to Indian manufacturers for their export products.
“This is the most effective tool to empower consumers; it is equivalent to creating an army of enforcement agents, who would participate in this drive against counterfeiting. Currently, we are rolling out this service for over 100 million packages in India and we see huge interest among consumers,” said Kishore Kar, director sales, PharmaSecure.
Counterfeit drugs are produced and sold with the intent to deceptively represent its origin, authenticity or effectiveness. “India is leading by rolling out track and trace system for its exports. The World is watching to see how the country will implement its bold plan. India must not retreat from its July 1, 2011 implementation goal,” said Thomas Woods, president and CEO, Woods International, LLC.
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