Ceram has published a white paper highlighting how surface analysis can expose counterfeit medicines and unlicensed manufacturing processes.
The white paper describes how technologies such as X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry are being used to analyse the composition of various pharmaceuticals and determine differences in the manufacturing processes involved.
Dr Justine Bentley, author of the white paper, said: 'Counterfeit medicines are incredibly dangerous and represent a significant challenge to public health, so it is vital that drug manufacturers and authorities implement stringent QA processes.
'Surface analysis enables the identification of previously undetectable chemical copies and the technology is now so sophisticated that we can determine the manufacturing process of, for example, a particular tablet to find out if it has been produced by the correct licensed process.
'If it hasn't, then that tablet is as much a potential health hazard as one that contains the wrong ingredient.' According to the World Health Organisation, counterfeit medicines are part of the broader substandard pharmaceuticals sector - medicines manufactured below established quality standards and, therefore, dangerous to patients' health and ineffective for the treatment of diseases.
They are deliberately and fraudulently mislabelled with respect to identity or source.
The US-based Centre for Medicines in the Public Interest predicts that counterfeit drug sales will be worth an estimated USD75 billion globally in 2010, an increase of more than 90 per cent from 2005.
