Food for thought...
Still deep concerns about health product quality in India. A current article recounts a bust at a major surgical supplier who was supplying hospitals with counterfeit surgical products, labeled as if they were made by Johnson & Johnson. Unable to get a response from their own authorities, a doctor from one of the hospitals contacted J&J, who successfully brought the complaint to the police. When the police raided the warehouses of Kumar Brothers, “the biggest drug dealer and supplier to the three government hospitals of Chandigarh,” there was a large stock of fake product. The Kumar brothers ran away. They contacted the authorities and blamed it all on one of their employees, who was jailed. They returned once they were promised they would have bail granted. The brothers then charged that J&J was only pursuing this because Kumar Brothers had cancelled some contracts with them. (Of course they had cancelled the contracts: they were getting fake J&J products much cheaper than the real thing.)
http://www.indianexpress.com/news/fake-goods-flood-markets-ut-police-go-cold-on-probe-trail/554739/1
The article has two pages, and you must click to the next page at the bottom.
The appearance is that the Kumar Brothers will skate on this one, having thrown their employee under the bus for it, as it were. No explanation why they ran away (or knew to run away), why they knowingly cancelled the J&J supply contracts (while still selling supposedly “J&J” goods), or why no one could work within the local system to complain about substandard and obviously fake hospital supplies, and had to go to the foreign company itself to get action. These supplies were for hernia, brain, and – you guessed it – heart surgeries. As stated in the article, this is just the tip of the iceberg, and punishments are often dropped, so there is little reason not to try to cheat some extra money out of the healthcare system.
I don’t doubt the intent and moral character of most of India’s doctors, but I would have a hard time having surgery in India, because the doctors’ good efforts can be so easily undermined by the rampant fraud of others.
Best wishes,
Still deep concerns about health product quality in India. A current article recounts a bust at a major surgical supplier who was supplying hospitals with counterfeit surgical products, labeled as if they were made by Johnson & Johnson. Unable to get a response from their own authorities, a doctor from one of the hospitals contacted J&J, who successfully brought the complaint to the police. When the police raided the warehouses of Kumar Brothers, “the biggest drug dealer and supplier to the three government hospitals of Chandigarh,” there was a large stock of fake product. The Kumar brothers ran away. They contacted the authorities and blamed it all on one of their employees, who was jailed. They returned once they were promised they would have bail granted. The brothers then charged that J&J was only pursuing this because Kumar Brothers had cancelled some contracts with them. (Of course they had cancelled the contracts: they were getting fake J&J products much cheaper than the real thing.)
http://www.indianexpress.com/news/fake-goods-flood-markets-ut-police-go-cold-on-probe-trail/554739/1
The article has two pages, and you must click to the next page at the bottom.
The appearance is that the Kumar Brothers will skate on this one, having thrown their employee under the bus for it, as it were. No explanation why they ran away (or knew to run away), why they knowingly cancelled the J&J supply contracts (while still selling supposedly “J&J” goods), or why no one could work within the local system to complain about substandard and obviously fake hospital supplies, and had to go to the foreign company itself to get action. These supplies were for hernia, brain, and – you guessed it – heart surgeries. As stated in the article, this is just the tip of the iceberg, and punishments are often dropped, so there is little reason not to try to cheat some extra money out of the healthcare system.
I don’t doubt the intent and moral character of most of India’s doctors, but I would have a hard time having surgery in India, because the doctors’ good efforts can be so easily undermined by the rampant fraud of others.
Best wishes,
