Fake drug ring leaders sentenced to 12 years in jail for smuggling and forgery

The jury of HoChiMinh City People's Court today decided on a verdict that accordingly, Nguyen Minh Hung and Vo Manh Cuong were sentenced to 12 years of imprisonment.

According to the indictment, the case originated when VN Pharma imported about 9,300 boxes of H-Capita 500mg as a cancer-treating drug.

The Drug Administration of Vietnam (DAV) requested the company to explain and inspect VN Pharma. The batch was sealed and suspended from being sold to the market.

The investigation results show that in 2013, Nguyen Minh Hung ordered Vo Manh Cuong to buy drugs labelled by Helix Canada for sale. He also tendered to supply those drugs to hospitals in Vietnam, including H-Capita 500mg Caplet.

Nguyen Minh Hung directed his two employees to compile the technical dossier for H-Capita 500mg to validate the procedures to the DAV.

With the counterfeit file submitted by VN Pharma, the DAV approved the mentioned batch. In April 2014, VN Pharma opened a customs declaration to import about 9,300 boxes of H-Capita 500mg into Vietnam.

However, the assessment of Ministry of Health (MoH) concluded that this batch contains 97% of capecitabine as an active ingredient, which is of unknown origin, bad quality, and therefore, cannot be used as a medicine for the human.

Although Vo Manh Cuong ordered that drug batch to sell to VN Pharma, he declared to be ignorant of its origin.

The investigation revealed that the drug had been stamped from India to Singapore before imported to Vietnam.

The bar code, however, was not registered by any country. The quality certificates are counterfeit. The investigators said all of more than 9,000 H-Capita 500mg boxes are of unknown origin.

Surprisingly, this batch could easily pull the wool over eyes of the DAV and MoH. Regarding the loosen management, Prime Minister has asked the MoH to issue a report on its state management responsibility, which should be submitted to him before August 31st.

Apart from forging the H-Capita 500mg profile, from 2012 to 2014, Nguyen Minh Hung also directed his staff to hire pharmacists to edit numerous other drug records, forge the seal and signature of Helix Canada’s directors and employees to be allowed to supply drugs. The value of smuggled goods was over VND5 billion (about US$220,000).

Also, Ngo Anh Quoc (Deputy Director of VN Pharma) were shown to have directed his staff to pay up to VND7.5 billion (roughly US$330,000) as the commission for many doctors to prescribe those counterfeit drugs to patients. He got four years for smuggling.

The MoH told the media, "The incident will be strictly dealt with if the address of any violated hospital is specified."

The MoH has also affirmed that it would strictly handle the violated cases by the law and would not cover any unit or individual under its management.