Falsified meds do not yet impose a serious threat in Hungary and the EU

“Due to strict regulations and legislatory monitoring no falsified or unauthorized medication has entered the legal drug supply chain in Hungary until now, stated the Hungarian Association of Innovative Pharmaceutical Manufacturers (AIPM).

This does not mean, however, that obtaining locally unauthorized preparations would be impossible, but illegal trade is mainly restricted to the internet. As of next February a pharmaceutical manufacturer specific European Union directive will come into effect: every packaging unit of prescription medication will have to be equipped with an individual identification number, the AIPM noted.

This predicts a highly complicated IT system, and to operate such, every EU member state was obligated to establish a national organization, which is called HUMVO (Hungarian Medicines Verification Organization Non-profit Ltd) in Hungary. The new system will control 17 billion units of medication in the EU on a yearly basis, which come from 4600 different manufacturing facilities and will be released at 177,000 different end points.”