Over 250,000 Illegal Medical Devices Including Thermometers and Stethoscopes Seized at Customs

Provided by Korea Customs Service

[Asia Economy (Daejeon) Reporter Jeong Il-woong] More than 250,000 illegal medical devices, including thermometers, stethoscopes, and medical forceps, were caught at the customs clearance stage while attempting to be imported into South Korea.

On the 26th, the Korea Customs Service announced that, in collaboration with the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety last year, it detected 258,414 illegal medical devices whose safety had not been verified.

The main seized items included medical forceps (used to grasp, manipulate, compress, or connect tissues), injection needles and puncture needles (used to collect liquids, cells, or tissues from the body), thermometers, and stethoscopes.

Previously, the Korea Customs Service expanded the scope of joint inspections from express cargo, which has a high proportion of personal imports, to general cargo mainly imported by companies. As a result, the number of items seized last year increased from 40,745 in 2019 to 258,414, according to the Customs Service.

However, during the same period, the seizure rate (ratio of seizures to inspections) decreased by 16 percentage points from 36% to 20%. The Customs Service explained that this was because individuals and companies who had already been penalized in 2019 became fully aware of the medical device import procedures and complied with the legality of overseas direct purchases.

Currently, importing medical devices from overseas into South Korea generally requires approval from the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety. However, imports without approval are allowed only for self-use medical devices accompanied by documents such as a diagnosis, medical devices for samples, testing, research, or relief purposes, and medical devices requiring urgent importation.

In this regard, since September 2018, the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety and the Korea Customs Service have been conducting joint inspections at Incheon Customs (airport) to prevent the import and personal use of unauthorized medical devices whose safety has not been verified.

A Korea Customs Service official stated, “We will strengthen joint inspections with the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety to preemptively block the import of unauthorized medical devices and protect individual consumers from damages caused by overseas direct purchases.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.