EU proposes four years' jail for drug counterfeiters

Those found guilty of producing or distributing counterfeit drugs could face four years in jail under new EU proposals.

Counterfeits, including medicinal counterfeits, may in the future be subject to criminal sanctions in the EU, which could mean fines running into hundreds of thousands of euros or up to four years in prison, according to draft legislation adopted by the European Parliament's Legal Affairs' Committee.

The parliamentary commission came to a decision in favour of prison sentences of up to four years or fines to a maximum of Euro 300,000 for serious infringements.

The new legislation on intellectual property should not be aimed only at the manufacturers of counterfeit products, but also at all those who are involved in the different stages leading to the distribution of these products in Europe.

However, part of the proposed legislation that may have allowed the use of criminal sanctions against generics companies found in breach of patent was removed in an amendment. The measures, which will soon be voted on in a plenary session in Parliament, now concern only the infringement of intellectual property rights, particularly trademark law.

The Parliament's Legal Affairs' committee voted massively in favour of two amendments, requesting that patents be excluded from the field of the future directive, to the tremendous relief of the European Generic Medicines Association (EGA).

The generic manufacturers fear in particular that should patents be included under this legislation, all violations of intellectual property will be punished in the same way. Although counterfeiting and piracy are criminal acts, patent infringements are not necessarily so, the association said.

The EGA feared the branded drugs industry could have used this directive to thrust legal disputes - currently settled before civil courts - into the criminal domain. This refers to possible infringements of patents that can occur during the development of a product.