Key Summary
- Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency and eBay removed dangerous fake medicines from sale.
- Over 200 harmful erectile dysfunction products were taken down to protect users.
- Experts warn buying medicines online can be risky and unsafe without proper checks.
The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has helped eBay delist illegal and dangerous medicines from the online platform and ensure public safety.
The ongoing partnership has removed around 215 potentially harmful erectile dysfunction medicines from eBay.
The MHRA’s Borderline products team, who are responsible for the classification of products, confirmed the products were fake and alerted eBay, which immediately removed the listings offering the erectile dysfunction tablets.
These illegally traded medicines are of dubious quality and they may either be totally ineffective or have dangerous side effects.
As they lack MHRA or any other regulatory body’s scrutiny, they may have no active ingredient, or too much, or toxic ingredients which could be dangerous, particularly for people taking medications.
eBay has been cooperating with the MHRA for many years, and its latest AI algorithm has helped identify and block more than two million violations of the company’s medicine policies, before they were offered for sale.
“We can all enjoy shopping online from trusted marketplaces like eBay, but when it comes to medicines and medical devices, a higher threshold of caution is needed for these products,” reminded Lynda Scammel, head of MHRA’s Borderline.
“Collaborations such as this between public agencies and private companies have a substantial role to play in tackling illegal sales of medical products and protecting the health and safety of UK citizens,” she added.
Health minister Dr Zubir Ahmed said, “Buying any medicine from illegal online suppliers significantly increases the risk of receiving falsified or unlicensed products, often with drastic consequences.
“Doing so not only risks your own life but often provides funding for other illegal activity, so I commend the work done by MHRA and eBay to tackle this.”
Erectile dysfunction affects around 4.3 million men in the UK, but studies show that two in five men are reluctant to seek medical advice, and often seek help online.
Interestingly, erectile dysfunction medicines remain one of the most frequently illegally traded medicines in the UK.
