The Economist (Sept 2, 2010) estimated that the counterfeit drug market is worth approximately $75-billion a year. Of all medicines sold worldwide, some 15 percent are counterfeit. In developing countries, counterfeit drugs amount to approximately 30 percent of drugs sold. In May 2010, the Sixty-Third World Health Assembly (WHA) established a Working Group to address the prevention and control of medical products of compromised quality, safety, and efficacy, such as substandard / spurious / falsely-labelled / falsified / counterfeit medical products (resolution WHA63(1). This Working Group is open to all member states. 

 The WHO is also looking at counterfeit drugs through the International Medical Products Anti-counterfeiting Taskforce (IMPACT). IMPACT was launched in 2006 to establish coordinated networks across and between countries to halt the production, trading, and selling of counterfeit medicines. 

The issue was on the agenda at the Sixty-Fourth World Health Assembly (WHA64) which took place in Geneva in May, 2011. At the meeting, member states reached a stalemate with regard to the definition of ‘counterfeit medicines’. Differences between member states could not be resolved and due to divergent views, the Working Group requested that members consider extending the period set out in WHA63(10) “in order to allow the Working Group to complete its work” after engaging in further deliberations. This extension was granted.  

Although the 193 member states of the WHO, including African countries, agreed to extend the period of the Working Group, positions are still polarized especially with regards to the linking of intellectual property to the issue of quality, safety and efficacy of medicines, and the role of IMPACT.