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Falsified medicines

Patient health and safety is of the utmost importance to Medicines for Europe which is engaged in numerous initiatives that are fighting against counterfeit medicines.

• EMVO (European Medicines Verification Organisation): The European Medicines Verification System (EMVS) is an interoperable pan-European Information Technology system that verifies the authenticity of medicines at the point of dispense to patients (in a local pharmacy or a hospital) in compliance with the EU Falsified Medicines Directive (FMD) and its supplementing Delegated Regulation (DR). The system, which went live in February 2019, connects all prescription medicine manufacturers to an EU hub and all pharmacies and hospitals to connected 31 national hubs across the EU and the EEA. EMVS, which is financed by manufacturers and marketing authorisation holders, is the biggest medicines verification IT system established in the world to date. Medicines for Europe presided over the board of EMVO for the period 2019-2021 and currently holds the position of Treasurer (2021-2023). Medicines for Europe is deeply involved in adapting the EMVS to challenges such as Brexit and enabling the better use of EMVS data to improve public health.
• Fight the Fakes: Fight the Fakes is a campaign to raise awareness about the dangers of fake medicines. The campaign gives a voice to those who have been personally impacted and shares the stories of those working stop to this threat to public health.
• ASOP: The Alliance for Safe Online Pharmacies (ASOP) protects patient safety by providing to safe and legitimate online pharmacies in accordance with applicable laws.
• Fakeshare: Fakeshare is a European project dealing with cooperation and intelligence against the online selling of falsified or illegal medicines through non-authorised e-pharmacies or other resellers.