Mail order and foreign buyers beware: Criminal organizations are circulating potentially lethal fake Ozempic

In December [2023], Drew, a 36-year-old man from San Antonio, Texas, drove more than 250 miles to Mexico to buy cheap Ozempic to help him lose weight. Going home, he checked the pens. They looked unusual, so he shared photos on social media. The verdict: They were fakes.

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Pharmaceutical companies, including Ozempic-maker Novo Nordisk, authenticate batches of drugs with combinations of letters and numbers printed on the packaging, which are then used to track the product in a given country.

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Bootlegged batch numbers and repackaged insulin are just part of the picture: criminals can divert or steal drugs from hospitals or other healthcare systems before adding fake labels and packaging, or they can simply put any liquid in a vial or stamp out pills and place them in counterfeit packaging, a Novo spokesperson said.

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“All these different potential origins, often via organized criminal networks involving multiple jurisdictions, represent serious challenges for those involved in fighting these crimes,” the spokesperson said.

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