Well done, NABP!

By Adam Fein on May 28, 2008 – 7:42 am

Last week, the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy (NABP) named 79 online pharmacies that are not safe for patients. Rather than a general “watch out” message, the NABP actually listed the web addresses for these rogue sources.

Kudos to for naming names! I hope the NABP has a good firewall to repel the disgruntled spammers.

According to NABP, a site got on the bad guy list for one of the following three illegal activities:

  • Does not require a valid prescription (71 sites)
  • Foreign or non-FDA-approved drugs (35 sites)
  • A physical address outside of the US (36 sites)

NABP has accredited 15 legitimate online pharmacies though the Verified Internet Pharmacy Practice Sites™ (VIPPS®) program. In contrast, the 79 non-recommended sites are non-accredited through the Fake Online Outlets League™ (FOOL®) program. (NABP doesn’t seem to allow direct links. Go to NABP and click “Internet Pharmacies” to find the list.)

Fans of buying “Canadian” drugs should take note: Twenty-two of the sites on the NABP list have “Canada” in the company name.  You have been warned.

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Posted in Counterfeit Drugs, Pharmacies |

3 Comments to “Well done, NABP!”

  1. Allan Coukell Says:
    May 30th, 2008 at 8:15 am

    NABP standards for accreditation include the following:

    “The pharmacy, in accordance with applicable state and federal laws and regulations, must be domiciled in the United States.”

    Therefore, by definition no Canadian pharmacy can be accredited. But this also, by definition, fails to address the integrity of the supply from these businesses.

  2. Adam Fein Says:
    May 30th, 2008 at 9:14 am

    Allan,

    Good point. You are raising what I call “the demand side problem”: How do we stop domestic pharmacy buyers and U.S. consumers from purchasing outside of a theoretically secure supply chain?

    I have been investigating this issue for quite some time, such as my blog post from September 2006:

    http://www.drugchannels.net/2006/09/our-demand-side-counterfeit-drug.html

    Loads more stuff on my Drug Channels blog. However, I still believe that opening up diversion channels is asking for trouble.

    Adam

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    June 12th, 2008 at 9:51 am

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