Counterfeit medicine bust: Advertised as hand-carried goods for sale via Facebook, Zalo

The amount of fake drugs that Thanh Hoa Police just seized - Photo: Provided by Thanh Hoa Provincial Police

According to the initial investigation results of Thanh Hoa Provincial Police, taking advantage of people's habit of buying medicine without a doctor's prescription; lack of knowledge about the origin of medicine; elderly people buy and use medicine to treat bone and joint diseases, pain, numbness at cheap prices.

The group that produces and trades fake drugs also takes advantage of loopholes in the State management of pharmaceutical business activities at drugstores and pharmacies to operate in a sophisticated manner.

The leaders and operators of this group are Nguyen Tien Dat (34 years old, residing in Thanh Xuan district, Hanoi ) and Trinh Doan Giao (40 years old, residing in Binh Tan district, Ho Chi Minh City) who invested in production lines and machinery, and researched the ingredients of modern medicine.

This group ordered raw materials such as pharmaceuticals, medicinal herbs, and herbs of unknown origin, hired workers to mix and grind them into powder, used machines to form capsules, blister packs, and packaged the finished fake drugs, then sold them to the market through distribution channels.

The group's method of dealing with bone and joint diseases is that they do not counterfeit existing products on the market, but instead create their own drug names and company names based in Hong Kong, Malaysia, and Singapore, which can easily confuse consumers.

Equipment and machinery used to produce counterfeit drugs - Photo: Provided by Thanh Hoa Provincial Police

Regarding production methods, the group rented warehouses as locations to produce fake drugs in deserted areas, dead-end alleys deep in alleys in Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, and Long Xuyen City ( An Giang ).

Hire workers to produce fake drugs from relatives or acquaintances. Workers live in closed warehouses and do not interact with surrounding residents.

When selling fake drugs to the market, the group colludes closely from the production stage to the distribution channel to bring fake drugs to users.

Under the guise of being a pharmacist selling drugs for pharmaceutical companies, the group uses social networks like Zalo and Facebook to advertise that they have genuine antibiotics from the company, "smuggled" from bidding sources or selling out of the region, and cannot issue invoices so they sell them cheaper than genuine products.

According to Thanh Hoa Provincial Police, with "counterfeit" drugs of foreign origin , the group introduced Because it is "hand-carried" goods, there is no invoice or accompanying documents to gain the trust of the buyer.

To gain trust from customers, this group often buys real drugs and mixes them with fake drugs produced and sold by the group , in order to avoid inspection by the authorities. authorities

Once they have a certain number of customers, this group only sells self-produced fake drugs . The place where this group sells fake drugs is pharmacists who sell drugs freely at small drug stores.

As reported by Tuoi Tre Online, Thanh Hoa Provincial Police have just Dismantling the production and trafficking of fake drugs Nguyen Tien Dat and Trinh Doan Giao took the lead in managing.

Police seized 21 types of modern medicine, fake bone and joint medicine; nearly 10 tons of fake medicine and raw materials to make fake medicine.

From 2021 until the time of arrest, this line sold a large quantity of fake drugs to the market, with an estimated amount of nearly 200 billion VND.

Regarding this ring, Thanh Hoa Provincial Police have initiated a case and prosecuted 14 defendants for "producing and trading in counterfeit disease prevention and treatment drugs".

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HA DONG

Source: https://tuoitre.vn/vu-triet-pha-thuoc-gia-quang-cao-la-hang-xach-tay-de-ban-qua-facebook-zalo-20250428184242985.htm