On Wednesday 2 April, the Council of Europe published its first report on the implementation of its ‘Medicrime Convention’ on counterfeit medical products.
This text analyses the measures taken by 13 of the States party to the Convention (including Belgium, Croatia, Cyprus, France, Hungary, Portugal and Switzerland) to tackle this phenomenon in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The following topics are covered:
- Prevention and training of those responsible for combating counterfeit medical products: regulatory authorities are in place, but their training is not uniform and is sometimes very inadequate;
- Protection of victims: considered adequate;
- Cooperation and exchange of information: the systems in place must be evaluated regularly and have a point of contact;
- Detection and investigation: detection of counterfeit products remains inadequate, but investigations are systematic even in the absence of a complaint;
- Penalties and data collection: harmonisation of penalties is called for, as well as a strengthening of data collection in order to assess the impact of falsified medical products (a crucial issue in times of health crisis).
In order to strengthen the implementation of the ‘Medicrime Convention’, the Monitoring Committee notes the importance of cooperation between all stakeholders, including civil society, and encourages the efforts made by the States Parties to raise awareness of the risks of counterfeit products and the dangers associated with online purchases on unauthorised platforms.
Link to the monitoring report: https://aeur.eu/f/g7i (Original version in French by Véronique Leblanc)