Pfizer identifies fake Covid-19 photos abroad as criminals exploiting vaccine application

About 80 people at a clinic in Mexico received a fake vaccine for about $ 1,000 a dose, although they do not appear to have been physically injured. The bottles, found in beach-style beer coolers, had a different number of batches than those sent to the state and a wrong expiration date, said Dr. Manuel de la O, Nuevo León’s health secretary.

Polish authorities said no one there received the counterfeit vaccine, which was confiscated in a man’s apartment.

The findings are the latest efforts between law enforcement and drugmakers such as Pfizer, Moderna Inc.

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and Johnson & Johnson to stop criminal activity related to Covid-19 vaccines. The global launch of the shootings gave criminals a new opportunity to take advantage of unsuspecting people.

“Everyone on the planet needs it. Many are desperate for it, “said Lev Kubiak, Pfizer’s head of global security. “We have a very limited supply, a supply that will increase as we grow and other companies will enter the vaccination space. In the meantime, there is a perfect opportunity for criminals. ”

The United States, Mexico and other countries have confiscated and demolished dozens of websites that fraudulently claimed to sell photos or an affiliation with vaccine manufacturers such as Moderna and Pfizer, according to government officials and records. Fake websites, similar to the company, appeared to be looking for consumers’ personal information to be used in identity fraud schemes, say government and industry officials.

Police in China and South Africa last month confiscated thousands of doses of counterfeit Covid-19 vaccines in warehouses and factories, arresting dozens of people, according to the international police agency Interpol. Mexico is also investigating a shipment of about 6,000 doses of the alleged Russian Sputnik vaccine, which were seized from a private plane bound for Honduras. Authorities have not determined whether the vaccines are genuine.

For months, agents at the National Center for the Coordination of Intellectual Property Rights, an investigative arm of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, have been investigating fraud related to the Covid-19 pandemic globally, recovering $ 48 million in disguise. fake, personal protective equipment and other products. Last fall, investigators shifted their focus to include Covid-19 vaccines that were nearing potential elimination by regulators, starting with online scams. They removed 30 websites and confiscated 74 web domains, according to IPR officials.

To date, no counterfeit vaccines have been found in the United States, according to DHS. But the limited supply of Covid-19 photos and their high demand may lead people to seek vaccinations outside official channels, especially in countries such as Mexico and Brazil, where cases of Covid-19 are high and there is a history of counterfeiting of drugs released on recipe base, industry and security experts said.

“Whenever you see this mismatch between supply and demand in certain areas, there are people who are willing to fill this gap with counterfeits,” said Tony Pelli, a BSI Group consultant who focuses on drug safety. “For new drugs, it’s usually only a matter of time before they see people trying to counterfeit them.”

Counterfeiting of prescription drugs has become more profitable in the last decade, say industry and security officials. The counterfeit prescription drug market is valued at more than $ 200 billion annually, according to PricewaterhouseCoopers.

False distribution of Covid-19 vaccines is also easier than stealing and selling legitimate shots because of the extreme security measures taken by countries and drug manufacturers during the pandemic, Mr Pelli said. “With counterfeits, you can introduce yourself and say, ‘Here are the Covid vaccines, we have some, don’t ask how’ and start distributing them,” Mr Pelli said.

Major drug manufacturers, such as Pfizer, are hiring security teams of former law enforcement officials to help train government agencies and help with investigations into prescription drugs. In recent years, Pfizer has worked with law enforcement to find sellers of fake doses of erectile dysfunction treatment Viagra and the antianxiety drug Xanax.

One tactic used by IPR Center agents is to search the web light and dark with keywords related to the vaccines provided by their manufacturers.

“We have never seen so much fraud, misinformation and schemes,” said Steve Francis, director of the IPR Center, which has opened more than 35 cases of Covid-19 vaccine fraud.

Mr. Francis and Pfizer’s agents began meeting weekly last fall to prepare for scams and counterfeits. During a presentation, company officials said they did not initially release images with the authentic labels on the bottle, in part as a means of remaining in front of criminals.

Pfizer also works with local law enforcement authorities in cases of counterfeit vaccines, such as those recently discovered in Mexico and Poland.

Polish police held a number of vials filled with a liquid in January and labeled Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine in a man’s apartment, according to Pfizer and Polish authorities. According to Polish prosecutors leading the investigation, no one is believed to have received a false fire. Polish police arrested the man, who was accused of fraud, Polish authorities said.

Pfizer suspected the vaccines were fake because they were not in the vials the company uses for its Covid-19 fire, Mr Kubiak said. They were identical to the containers recovered by the police in the man’s apartment, which had a label for the anti-wrinkle treatment of another company.

Pfizer tested the liquid in the vials that is supposed to be his Covid-19 vaccine at his laboratory in Groton, Conn.

In early February, Mexican police attacked a clinic in northern Nuevo León, where alleged fake vaccines were given to people. Mexican police detained six people.

“People were injected with distilled water,” Dr. De la O said in a telephone interview. A spokesman for Mexico’s Attorney General’s Office, which is conducting the investigation, declined to comment.

Pfizer, which is working with DHS officials to support Mexican authorities in this case, confirmed that the vaccine was fake after using special light and microscopic tests to find the adhesive label on the bottle was not genuine. Mr Kubiak declined to give further details, but said Pfizer could carry out more tests on the liquid.

Mr Kubiak said the counterfeiting is expected to worsen as the launch continues. “At the moment, consumers are slightly fooled,” he said. “They are desperate for the vaccine.”

Write to Jared S. Hopkins at [email protected] and José de Córdoba at [email protected]