Seek And Ye Shall Find

Interesting stuff yesterday at the Florida conference I'm attending on pharmaceutical anti-counterfeiting.  A drug company explained their process for risk assessment.  They use thirty-six questions to get managers to drill deeply into possible product vulnerabilities, but the most important are the first three:

1. Has this product ever (to your knowledge) been counterfeited?
2. Has this product ever (to your knowledge) been diverted (ie sold in unauthorised channels or markets)?

And here is the killer question:

3. Have you ever checked 1 and 2 thoroughly (by market surveys etc)?

Many of the operating companies and managers that answered yes to 1 and 2 could not say yes to 3.

Question 3 is the critical point here.  Unless you really look hard, you don't know whether you have a counterfeiting and/or diversion problem.  If you dont know what your problem is, you can't begin to address it and patients will remain at risk.