Interpol congratulates Telangana DCA over seizure of spurious drugs

Hyderabad, Jan 20:  The International Criminal Police Organization has congratulated the Drugs Control Administration (DCA), Telangana, on the successful seizures of counterfeit drugs.

The praise by Interpol, which carries out major operations to crack down on counterfeit medicines across several countries in the world, came after it learnt about spurious drug rackets busted by the DCA, Telangana.

According to V.B. Kamalasan Reddy, the Director General of DCA, Interpol congratulated the DCA in a letter dated January 16.

Spurious drugs are a major threat to public health. They not only fail to cure diseases but over time, create disastrous consequences for the patient.

Spurious drugs are by their very nature difficult to detect. They are often designed to appear identical to the genuine product.

The DCA officers are working relentlessly to detect spurious drugs' movement in the market and making every effort to make the state free of spurious drugs, Reddy said.

On December 29, 2023, the DCA busted a counterfeit drug racket of fake antibiotics, hypertension and cholesterol medicines, and analgesics which are falsely labelled under the names of reputed companies like Sun Pharma, Glenmark Pharma, Aristo Pharmaceuticals, Torrent Pharma and certain antibiotics claimed to be manufactured by a fictitious company which were shipped to Hyderabad through courier from Kashipur, Uttarakhand.

The DCA seized stocks valued at Rs 26 lakh.

On January 3, 2024, the DCA busted a counterfeit antibiotics racket involved in shipping fake antibiotics to Telangana through couriers from Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh. It seized fake antibiotics valued at Rs 22.95 lakh during raids at Uppal and Dilsukhnagar, Hyderabad.

It also issued an advisory to the public on spurious drugs on January 12 for public awareness.