Would you buy medicines made in this room?

Of course you never did, but did you know that 3% of the Swedish population between 25 and 65 years old claim in a survey from 2007 that they have ordered medications on the internet. That is why this campaign called Crime Medicine was launched last month in Sweden by the Swedish Medical Products Agency.
Crime Medicine is a campaign to inform citizens that more than 50 percent of prescription drugs sold on the internet are counterfeit and potentially dangerous, or substandard.

In the same survey, 35 percent of the respondents say that they might choose to go on the internet to find prescription drugs.

Barbro Gerdén, medical doctor at the Swedish Medical Products Agency, says that the online pharmacies frequently make false claims that they are certified, and they often feature trustworthy-looking “doctors” in white coats with stethoscopes hanging over their shoulders.
“These websites often claim that they can give credible online diagnosis, and recommend and sell the appropriate prescription drug to cure the problem. This is, of course, all bogus. You need to see a doctor in person to get a real diagnosis,” she says.

The campaign contains two items, a TV ad and a website. On TV the commercial tries to lure visitors to visit www.crimemedicine.com, with the promise of being able to buy drugs without prescription. The website seems to be a online pharmacy… for some seconds.

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