Company Supplying Unauthorized Herbal Medicine to Traditional Korean Medicine Clinics Caught... Referred to Prosecution

A pharmaceutical manufacturer that produced unauthorized herbal medicines and supplied them to Korean medicine hospitals and clinics, along with the involved representative, has been referred to the prosecution.

The Ministry of Food and Drug Safety's Central Investigation Unit for Hazardous Crimes announced on the 6th that pharmaceutical manufacturer Company A and its former representative Mr. B were sent to the prosecution on charges of violating the Pharmaceutical Affairs Act for manufacturing and selling herbal medicines without obtaining pharmaceutical product approval (notification). Legally, herbal medicines classified as pharmaceuticals must be approved by the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety for each product before manufacturing and sales are permitted.

According to the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety, from July 2015 to December last year, Mr. B supplied a total of 8.1 tons of 12 types of unauthorized herbal medicines, including ‘Hwanggi Milja’, manufactured by Company A, to Korean medicine hospitals and clinics. The sales amount was estimated to be approximately 390 million KRW.

During this process, Mr. B used packaging printed with the product names of approved items to package the unauthorized herbal medicines in order to avoid detection. It was also revealed that different colored stickers were used to distinguish them from approved products.

According to the Pharmaceutical Affairs Act, manufacturing and selling unauthorized pharmaceuticals is punishable by up to 5 years imprisonment or a fine of up to 50 million KRW.

A Ministry of Food and Drug Safety official stated, “The unauthorized pharmaceuticals manufactured by these parties will be subject to recall and other measures, and information about Korean medicine hospitals and clinics that used these products will be shared with the Ministry of Health and Welfare, the relevant authority.”

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