Buying Generic Sovaldi from India Takes a Strange Turn

Well things get stranger and stranger..

If you have been reading this blog for a while you will know that part of what I am doing is helping people to access affordable Hep C medication. At the moment this all comes from India in the form of generic Sofosbuvir and Ribavirin. 

Depending of a person’s wants and needs I either send them information on travelling to India to get the medication themselves or I send them information about how to arrange to have the medication couriered to their home.

If people wish me to I also act as a facilitator and help them to organise the necessary documentation, to buy from a reliable supplier and to get the courier organised. Part of this involves folk sending me money which I then forward by Western Union to the people in India. 

This process has been working really well and very effectively until this week when, out of the blue, Western Union refused to transmit any more funds from me to India. When I asked why they were doing this they did not give me an answer. When I explained that I had been using Western Union to do business with India for nearly 14 years with never any problem they still refused to give me a reason why they were blocking me.

Inspecting the situation on Wikipedia the only reason Western Union gives for blocking funds is they suspect someone of funding terrorism!!!

So I tried again and they blocked me again. Fortunately, thanks to the good will of the folk in India, this has not interrupted the supply chain as the people in India have been very understanding of the delay and kept processing the orders and sending them out even without payment (though this can not go on for long).

To circumvent Western Union’s blockade of the supply of Indian generic medicine to people suffering from Hep C I have now made the change to using international bank transfers which are more expensive and take three or four days for the banks to process. This, in turn, delays the shipment of medication.

Now whilst all this is quite annoying and rather an inconvenience the BIG question is: “Why has Western Union taken this action?”

There is certainly no legal reason for blocking me, everything I am doing is completely transparent. Indeed I have made an effort to be excessively transparent and happily give an exact break down of all costs and expenses to anyone who wants to know. As I have said this is not a business and is not run for profit, in fact if someone is suffering any kind of financial difficulty they only have to explain that to me and I will happily arrange for the medication to be sent to them at below cost. 

So why has Western Union blocked me? 

Has Big Pharma leaned on them?

Western Union is a vast USA based company that has managed to dominate the international money transfer market by buying out competitors. Does Western Union have connections with the equally vast USA based pharmaceutical companies? Do their C.E.Os play golf together?

I don’t know the answers but let’s just have a look at the facts. Since I have become involved in trying to help people gain access to affordable and reliable Hep C medication my computer has been hacked three times (at least) and Western Union has mysteriously blocked my ability to send funds to India.

Draw your own conclusions.