Duterte orders arrest of peddlers of fake drugs

President Rodrigo Roa Duterte. ROBINSON NIÑAL JR./PRESIDENTIAL PHOTO

President Rodrigo Duterte has ordered the Philippine National Police (PNP) to arrest peddlers of fake drugs after the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) warned the public on the proliferation of fake medicines.

“The President ordered the PNP Chief to arrest persons who manufacture, import, trade, administer, dispense, deliver, distribute, fake drugs and charge them with Economic Sabotage,” Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Salavador Panelo told reporters in Malacañang on Wednesday.

Panelo said “those acts undermine not only the economy” but would also “affect the law of supply of the demand, affect the prices,” and “threatens the security of the nation because it endangers the vast health of the people.”

“That is why to the President’s mind, these people should be arrested and charged for economic sabotage,” he said.

Panelo said the Chief Executive gave the orders on Tuesday night.

READ: FDA warns vs fake paracetamol tablets

On Monday, the FDA warned consumers against the purchase and consumption of counterfeit Biogesic paracetamol 500-milligram tablets.

“All health care professionals and the general public are hereby warned as to the availability of this counterfeit drug product in the market, which poses potential danger or injury to consumers,” the FDA said. /je