Because of the increasing demand for generic Hep C treatments from India and the money that can be made supplying these medicines a number of things have happened.
Firstly a huge number of “suppliers” has been spawned. Most of these people have no experience of a pharmaceutical or medical nature but have simply seen a chance to make quick money by creating a website and selling generic Hep C meds online.
I recently did an interview with a Chinese reporter who told me that there were now hundreds of websites in China selling Indian generics to the Chinese, often to outrageously high prices.
In India it is the same and most European countries have “suppliers”.
Some are good, some not so good and some are just plain rip off merchants.
This proliferation of ’suppliers’ has created quite a bit of competition between them, which on the surface is a good thing because it has reduced prices however it has also created some problems.
In order to sell at a competitive price some suppliers of generic medicines have reduced their price to below actual cost and are making their profits by putting inferior or fake medicines in with the real meds. This means that whilst a patient will get a response, such as a viral load reduction and an improvement in liver function, the response will not be sustained because of the low dose level.
Another consequence of competition is that people are saying that one brand of generic Hep C medicine is better than the other.
For example a supplier of Cipla products will say that the Hetero generic Harvoni is not good quality and visa versa.
The reality is that all licensed generic Harvoni and Sofosbuvir is made by two India pharmaceutical manufacturers Hetero and Natco; all the other brands are made by these two companies and simply have different coloured tablets and different labels.
Here is an extra from a post by well known international Hep C advocate Giten
It has been brought to our notice that people are saying some brands of the Hep C medicines are better in quality than others. It is NOT TRUE. If you are sourcing from India, all the medicines are manufactured, currently, either by NATCO or Hetero. It apparently is coming from people who sells mostly Cipla (Hepcvir L) brand. This is completely wrong information and please do not believe in this as it could be that they are spreading to sell the medicines they have. Anyone who has a Hepcvir L or Hepcdac bottle right now with yourself can check in the packaging and bottle and you will see it is written there that it is manufactured by Hetero. Please share this information, do not spread such rumors and please do not believe in it if you hear..........
