Minilabs save lives

10/06/2026

The Gambia: Medicines testing now expanded from GPHF-Minilab to a fully-fledged lab

Last week, Gambia’s President Adama Barrow inaugurated the country’s first national food and drug quality control laboratory. The project is estimated to be worth US$10 million and was funded by the World Bank. The new laboratory is expected to drastically improve public health and consumer safety by enabling local testing of medicines and food. With the exception of the GPHF Minilab, which was made available to the country back in 2009, The Gambia has so far lacked domestic testing infrastructure, meaning that time-sensitive and complex samples had to be sent to laboratories abroad. This new facility will help the Ministry of Health and the Medicines Authority to detect substandard or falsified products and strengthen nationwide health security. For more information you want to go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FUE_13QTHH4

01/06/2026

Joint Europol and Eurojust investigation team cracks down on the trade in falsified medicines

Europol has successfully supported an international operation targeting a large-scale criminal network involved in the manufacture, distribution and sale of counterfeit medicines and food supplements. The operation, which was carried out in Poland, Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria and Moldova, and for which requests for mutual legal assistance were made in a further ten countries, aimed to dismantle the infrastructure of this illegal trade. To this end, a joint investigation team was set up at Eurojust. Further information can be found at https://tinyurl.com/nhcznprd.

22/05/2026

Millions of falsified medicines seized

An operation coordinated by INTERPOL across 90 countries and regions has led to the seizure of 6.42 million doses of unauthorised and counterfeit medicines worth US$15.5 million. Operation Pangea XVIII from March this year resulted in 269 arrests and the dismantling of 66 criminal groups involved in the illegal trade in medicines. Law enforcement agencies worldwide launched 392 investigations and executed 158 search warrants against criminal networks distributing unauthorised, counterfeit, substandard and falsified medical products. Among the most frequently seized products were medicines for erectile dysfunction, sedatives, painkillers, antibiotics and smoking cessation products. In addition, as part of digital enforcement measures, around 5,700 criminally operated websites, social media pages, channels and automated bots used to market and sell illegal medicines were taken down. For more information on the operation see here: https://tinyurl.com/f2duf8aa

02/04/2026

The Minilab from the www.GPHF.org is second to none. It has been installed a thousand times worldwide, and it feels like you can find one in every galaxy. Here, aliens are collecting GPHF-Minilabs destined for another solar system😊The GPHF team wishes the Artemis-II team a good trip to the moon.

03/03/2026

Alarming: Operation Shield VI once again reveals the extent of the illegal medicine market in Europe

A global investigation coordinated by Europol has once again documented the extent to which the illegal medicines market and organized crime now threaten public health. As part of Operation SHIELD VI, which was carried out between April and October 2025, more than 4,000 individual investigations were conducted, falsified medicines and illicit doping substances worth €33 million were seized, 15 laboratories and production facilities were raided, and preliminary investigations were launched against more than 3,300 individuals and their criminal networks. Further information can be found here:

Between April and November 2025, law enforcement, judicial, customs, medical and anti-doping authorities from 30 countries joined forces in Operation SHIELD VI. Europol coordinated this global effort targeting the trafficking of counterfeit and misused medicines, as well as illicit doping substances...

08/02/2026

AI use beats academic research when it comes to the assessment of screening technologies for the detection of substandard and falsified medicines during post-marketing medicines quality monitoring

This is to talk about the latest scientific paper on the “Global Landscape Assessment of Screening Technologies for medicine Quality Assurance: Stakeholder Perceptions and Practices from ten Countries”. Developing countries need affordable, portable screening technologies to quickly detect poor-quality medicines across the supply chain, helping reduce the burden on limited laboratory resources without replacing confirmatory testing. Expanding access to these tools can improve consumer safety, control substandard and falsified medicines, and provide better data on medicine quality. However, there are major gaps in both technology development and standardized information, which this study and paper aims to assess through a global evaluation of current practices and needs. The paper comes together with a “Dashboard on Portable Devices for Medicine Quality Screening” (https://dafodil.org) launched last month. When finish reading both, people may be more confused than ever before.

Spectroscopic methods work well for raw materials but are often too sensitive for finished pharmaceutical products (FPP) with changing recipes per geographical region and lack transferable reference spectra across devices of different brands. The GPHF-Minilab instead extracts active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) and adds weight, visual, and disintegration checks, making it widely used in over 100 low- and middle-income countries. Because of this practical approach, it is increasingly recognized - including by AI analyses - as a key screening tool for post-marketing medicine quality monitoring. When asked properly, AI, for example Chat GPT, gives a clear answer including a practical decision matrix for simple and inexpensive laboratory analyses for detecting falsified medicines, based on cost, significance and area of application.

16/12/2025

World Health Organization warns about falsified breast cancer medicine IBRANCE

The latest WHO Medical Product Alert this year reports the detection of nine lots of falsified breast cancer medicine IBRANCE (palbociclib) in parts of Africa, the Eastern Mediterranean, and Europe, including Côte d’Ivoire, Egypt, Lebanon, Libya, and Turkey. The falsified products, identified last month, were sold online and found in community pharmacies, and testing confirmed they contain no active pharmaceutical ingredient. Several invalid and suspicious lot numbers were identified, along with packaging, labelling, and capsule anomalies that differ from genuine IBRANCE. Because these products lack the active medicine, their use poses serious risks such as treatment failure, uncontrolled cancer progression, and increased risk of death. WHO urges health professionals, regulators, and the public to increase vigilance, report suspected cases, remove falsified products from circulation, and ensure medicines are obtained only from authorized suppliers. For more details consult the alert via the link as follows: https://tinyurl.com/mrzv87ww

09/12/2025

WHO Warns of Dangerous Falsified SIMULECT Found in Rwanda, Bulgaria, and Türkiye

The WHO has issued an alert about falsified transplant drug basiliximab (SIMULECT/Novartis) found in Rwanda, Bulgaria, and Türkiye. The fake product contains no active ingredient - only ascorbic acid - and shows multiple packaging discrepancies, including an invalid batch number (SFYD2) and incorrect labeling. Because it is ineffective and potentially harmful, its use can lead to organ rejection, severe reactions, or infections. Health-care professionals and regulators are urged to increase surveillance, report adverse events, and remove the falsified product from circulation. WHO advises the public to avoid using it, obtain medicines only from authorized suppliers, and seek medical help if exposed. For more details consult the alert via the link as follows: https://tinyurl.com/ynvrcwdx

17/11/2025

GPHF-Minilab at WHO Expert Meetings in Geneva, Switzerland, Presented

At the World Health Organization (WHO) in Geneva, two informal expert meetings were held last week Wednesday and Thursday as a side event on the margins of the meeting of the Steering Committee of the Member State Mechanism for Substandard and Falsified Medicines. The first information session addressed the topic of ‘Safety of excipients and laboratory capacities’, focusing in particular on responding to the risks posed by diethylene glycol and ethylene glycol (DEG/EG) through innovation and training. The second session dealt with the ‘Draft WHO Guidelines on the Selection and Use of Technologies for the Sreening and Detection of Substandard and Falsified Medicines’. The Global Pharma Health Fund (www.GPHF.org) presented its GPHF-Minilab for the detection and identification of fake medicines. Its partner, Prof. Lutz Heide from the University of Tübingen, acted as spokesperson for the GPHF at the second event when he presented the Minilab as an affordable and versatile field technology. In addition to the actual visitors, many institutions and authorities from all over the world took part using streaming services.

03/11/2025

GPHF-Minilab use: Quality assessment of cephalosporins in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

In a study conducted in Addis Ababa the quality of cephalexin, cefuroxime and ceftriaxone medicines was assessed using a three-step approach that included visual inspection, screening with GPHF-Minilab and confirmatory pharmacopoeial tests. A total of 56 samples were collected from various healthcare facilities in accordance with WHO guidelines and national guidelines. All samples passed the visual and screening tests, while two samples failed the test for uniformity of dosage units. Antimicrobial testing showed that cephalexin and cefuroxime were more effective against S. aureus, and ceftriaxone was most effective against P. mirabilis. Overall, the medicines were of good quality, but the varying antimicrobial efficacy suggests developing cephalosporin resistance. Further details can be found in the full publication: https://tinyurl.com/4przk9en