U.K. Health Service Bought Antiretroviral Drugs Illegally Di-
verted From Poorer Countries, BBC News Reports
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27 April, 2005
Reprinted with permission from kaisernetwork.org
The United Kingdom's National Health Service has purchased anti-
retroviral drugs illegally diverted from developing countries
around the world, according to a report on BBC Radio's... Five
Live Report, BBC News reports. The country's Department of
Health said they have guidelines to ensure diverted medicines do
not end up being used by NHS. However, a British-based company
that holds "major" NHS contracts is being investigated by the
U.K. Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency over
allegations it obtained supplies of antiretrovirals that origi-
nally were destined for Kenya but were diverted back to the
United Kingdom (Chapman, BBC News, 4/24). Drugs provided as
"aid" to developing countries are not allowed to be brought back
into the 25-nation European Union, the Daily Mail reports
(Brooke, Daily Mail, 4/25). Five Live reported multiple cases of
drugs that originally were destined for Africa or Eastern Europe
being purchased by NHS. Some of these are summarized below.
* Former bookmaker Adam Knight of Nazeing, England, in January
was fined approximately US$ 95,000 after admitting he made a
profit of about US$ 286,000 on antiretrovirals meant for Africa
that were eventually bought by NHS.
* The pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline has said some of
its antiretrovirals earmarked for Senegal, the Democratic Repub-
lic of Congo and Chad were imported back in the United Kingdom
via Switzerland and that the drugs were sold to NHS by the phar-
maceutical company Dowelhurst. GSK filed a lawsuit against Dow-
elhurst claiming that the company must have known the drugs were
destined for Africa because of the "cheap prices" it paid for
them, according to BBC News. Dowelhurst denied the charge, say-
ing they paid "normal prices" for the drugs but acknowledged
that Claude Horn, the Swiss trader from whom the company bought
the GSK drugs, was not licensed to sell them in the European Un-
ion, according to BBC News.
* A British company called UK Aid -- established to supply an-
tiretrovirals and other necessary drugs to Eastern Europe --
sold antiretrovirals to an Italian pharmaceutical company even
though it did not have an E.U. prescription drug license, ac-
cording to BBC News. Some of those drugs were bought by NHS, BBC
News reports. However, UK Aid Director Leslie Silverman and
pharmaceutical consultant Martin Mitchell said the allegations
against the company are "rubbish," but they did not comment fur-
ther, according to BBC News.
Reaction
An unnamed senior buyer for NHS said the agency has to trust
that its suppliers obtain their antiretroviral drugs legally. "I
remember being offered batches of antiretrovirals and being a
bit suspicious of where they had come from," the buyer said,
adding, "There were enough concerns on my part to have them
tested, but when we found nothing wrong with the drugs we bought
them. You don't have the time to find out where every batch has
come from" (BBC News, 4/24). At the pre-trial hearings in the
Dowelhurst case, Judge Peter Prescott said he was surprised GSK
would supply Dowelhurst "without taking any precautions to see
that the medicines really did arrive in, and stay in, West Af-
rica" (Boseley, Guardian, 4/25). GSK said that it is implement-
ing new security measures, including changing the color of pills
it gives to not-for-profit groups (BBC News, 4/24).
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