E-DRUG: Medical Product Quality Reports - COVID-19 Issues
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Dear colleagues,
Over the last two years, the COVID-19 pandemic has been accompanied by a
multitude of reports of diverted, substandard, and falsified (SF) medical
products. Since the beginning of the pandemic, we have identified over a
thousand articles on quality problems with COVID-19 medical products in the
English language lay press.
Please read about these in the Medical Product
Quality Report - COVID-19 Issues
<https://www.iddo.org/mq/research/medical-product-quality-reports>,
which holds reports from the scientific literature, public alerts/warnings, and lay press.
The fifteenth issue, covering the months of January, February, and March
2022, is now available and reports on 77 different incidents of quality
issues with COVID-19 medical products from articles from searches in Google
News (in the English language). It is out at
https://www.iddo.org/document/medical-product-quality-report-covid-19-issues-issue-15-september-2022-data-january-march
COVID-19 VACCINES: In Part A, we have issued a further summary of public
domain reports on quality issues with COVID-19 vaccines we are aware of.
Since the beginning of the pandemic we have recorded 184 reports of
incidents on quality issues with COVID-19 vaccines linked to 48 different
countries. In January, February, and March 2022, 6 new incidents were
reported. Falsified Covishield and Cadila's ZyCoV-D were seized in India.
For the first time, an incident was reported in Ireland with the seizure of
falsified COVID-19 'Prophylactics/Pfizer Vaccine tablets'. Other countries
where we identified incidents for the first time were Rwanda (diversion of
AstraZeneca and Moderna vaccines), and Singapore where a doctor allegedly
injected patients with saline solution instead of COVID-19 vaccines.
OTHER COVID-19 MEDICAL PRODUCTS: Part B discusses diagnostics, personal
protective equipment (PPE), sanitisers & disinfectants, medicines, and
'ventilation & oxygenation equipment and consumables'.
Several articles reported on issues of falsified products in the Philippines, from falsified COVID-19 antigen test kits and face masks, to many different medicines such as molnupiravir, herbal medicines, and paracetamol.
In March, WHO issued an alert for falsified remdesivir in Guatemala and India containing no active ingredient. The Pan African enforcement operation on Illicit Pharmaceutical Products in Africa has led to the arrest of hundreds of suspects and the seizure of over 12 million illicit health products, including hundreds of COVID-19 test kits and several thousand masks.
During the pandemic, existing vulnerabilities such as impaired access, poor
governance, weak technical capacity combined with high demand and shortages
of genuine products contributed to an increased global risk of substandard
and falsified medical products. This issue of the report is the last issue
that we will publish. We will further analyse the data that were gathered
in the last 2 years to inform strategies for better preparedness in
preventing, detecting, and responding to substandard and falsified medical
products for the next pandemic.
Any remarks or additions to content are greatly appreciated (please write
to medicinequality@iddo.org). We would be delighted if you could
disseminate this information within your networks.
Very best wishes,
Inthaphavanh Kitignavong, Kerlijn Van Assche, Céline Caillet, & Paul N
Newton
Medicine Quality Research Group, Infectious Diseases Data Observatory
(IDDO) & Mahidol Oxford Research Unit (MORU), Centre for Tropical Medicine
& Global Health, Nuffield Department of Medicine, University of Oxford,
Oxford, UK
Kerlijn Van Assche <kerlijn.vanassche@iddo.org>