Watered-down Or Phony Drugs Difficult To Trace.

There's little chance that patients will ever know whether they were given counterfeit or diluted medicines sold by unscrupulous distributors in South Florida, experts said Monday.

"Once the product gets in the supply chain, it's very difficult to track it," said David Webster, a health-care consultant for Webster Consulting Group in Bethlehem, Pa. "It's like trying to track the spread of SARS from one person to another."

Investigators say the drugs distributed by the 19 wholesalers indicted Monday included some used to treat cancer, HIV, AIDS and kidney failure, such as Epogen, Procrit, Neupogen and Gammagard.

State agents seized thousands of doses of phony drugs, but thousands more made it to health providers throughout Florida and the nation, experts said. And there's virtually no way for doctors and pharmacists to know whether the drugs they are administering are tainted.

Drugs often pass through a complex network of manufacturers, distributors and wholesalers before reaching a hospital or pharmacy.

And because sales records are often incomplete, it is virtually impossible for investigators to follow the trail.

Because the U.S. pharmaceutical industry is considered the safest in the world, hospitals and pharmacists have become complacent about the possibility that drugs could be harmful, experts said.

"If you talk to pharmacists, there's almost an air of invincibility about them," Webster said. "They take the safety of what they receive from distributors for granted."

By Greg Groeller
Orlando Sentinel
July 22, 2003