Group calls for more to be done to tackle corruption in the pharmaceutical industry

Corruption is rife in the global pharmaceutical sector and governments need to do more to tackle it, a report from Transparency International, a global anti-corruption action group, has said.1

As of the beginning of 2016, one in 10 corruption investigations in the US has involved pharmaceutical companies, the report said—which is far higher than the number of cases that involve the banking sector.

The report also showed that nearly half of corruption cases investigated in the health sector related to sales and marketing; that good manufacturing practice standards were vulnerable to bribery and corruption because of a lack of enforced regulation; that many countries had few safeguards to prevent vital medicines disappearing during the …