Authorities seize $5.4mn of fake drugs

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A number of drugs from different international brands were uncovered in the raid. (Getty Images)

Dubai Customs has seized over 20 million dirhams ($5.4 million) worth of counterfeit sexual stimulants and sedative drugs in one of the region’s largest busts, it was announced on Tuesday.

The raid turned up five million tablets and thousands of expired food products in a warehouse of a company operating at Jebel Ali Free Zone Area (Jafza), Dubai Customs said in a statement.

The warehouse of the company contained many types of counterfeit drugs from different international brand names, as well as large quantities of unknown pills, Dubai Customs said.

The warehouse manager and other workers have also been arrested for changing dates on expired food products.

“The popularity of the confiscated drugs makes them very dangerous. The food products could have caused serious health problems if the company had managed to sell them in the local market,” said Ahmed Butti Ahmed, director general of Dubai Customs.

“Dubai Customs protects the interests of investors in the UAE and is also committed to implement the international agreements and the Federal laws of the UAE, thus contribute in the welfare and security in the UAE and turn it into an international leading centre for combating counterfeit products,” he added.

Ahmed said the drugs were most likely to have originated from Pakistan and smuggled into Jafza using courier services over a period of time, UAE daily Khaleej Times reported.

The move follows a series of similar raids carried out by the government body in which large amounts of fake drugs and products have been seized.

In July, Dubai Customs confiscated 5 million dirhams ($1.4 million) worth of fake Plavix pills - an anti-clotting drug used to treat heart ailments - at Dubai’s Cargo Village. Customs inspectors at the cargo facility found around 556,000 fake Plavix pills packed in 20,000 boxes and shipped from the Mauritius islands.

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READERS' COMMENTS

Fake Drugs and Expired foods
Posted by Hani Zaitoun, Dubai, UAE on Monday 17 September 2007 at 09:00 UAE time

Protection of consumer health should remain a priority for governmental bodies applying serious sentencing for dealers, distributors and traders. Similarly, campaigns need to bring more awareness of how possibly identify a product to be fake, or a product which seems to have expired or has a different taste / smell etc. The possibility of opening a call center to receive consumer complains about products will help the government in its combat against fake products and expired foods.

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