The War Against Counterfeit Medicine

Book excerpt: There is a general agreement that piracy; counterfeiting and passing off are unfair. However, there is often surreptitious - or even open - sympathy for, say, those who purchase counterfeit designer fashions or the latest technical gadgets. The pirate is even sometimes represented as a daring evil hero. In this book, Prof. Dora Nkem Akunyili, Director General of Nigeria's National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control, presents a unique study of a global phenomenon in which law-breaking and profiteering prevail at the cost of human health and life - and of the ways in which this can be fought by appropriate legislation, regulation and enforcement.