New tactic in fight against phony drugs

Shanghai's police have solved 150 counterfeit food and drug cases this year, officials said at a press conference Monday.

"We have been trying to dig deeper into these cases to prevent counterfeit food and drugs from spreading by destroying their source," said Cheng Yiping, director of the Shanghai Public Security Bureau's financial crime division.

Unlike previous cases in which Shanghai's police focused on crimes within the city, they are now working with police officers from other parts of China to stop the production and transportation of counterfeit products, along with their sale, Chen said.

The Pudong New Area police joined forces with police officers in Henan, Hubei and Zhejiang provinces to bust a five-person ring in March suspected of producing and selling counterfeit medicine.

The suspects were selling two kinds of drugs as if they were traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) used to treat asthma and rheumatism, said Jiang Min, a senior Pudong police officer. "The suspects listed rare TCM ingredients on the labels, but the medicine actually contained little of the claimed TCM compounds," Jiang added.

The drugs contained large doses of hormones that could relieve asthma patients' symptoms in the short term, but ultimately posed a danger to their health, Jiang said. Although neither drug had been approved by the China Food and Drug Administration, their labels listed fabricated drug approval numbers.

The two medicines had been popular with senior citizens, Jiang told the Global Times. One resident helped the ring sell the drugs out of his home for 25 yuan ($4.06) to 30 yuan per bottle.

"The medicines were produced in small workshops in Hebei Province," said the officer in charge of the case surnamed Guo. "The suspects hired local families to make the medicines in their homes. They would purchase the medicine from the families as they saw fit."

Jiang said the medicine even appeared on television shopping channels in some provinces.

Two of the Shanghai-based suspects, surnamed Zhu and Huo, began to source the medicine from other provinces in May 2012.

Police have rooted out the workshops, confiscating about 1,000 bottles of the medicine. The case involved more than 5.5 million yuan worth of the counterfeit medicine.

Shanghai police have solved 600 cases in their campaign this year against counterfeit products.