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Criminals who produce, sell inferior products could face the death penalty

Judicial organs in China have further detailed how laws related to drug safety violations should be applied, as well as standards for handling such cases, pledging heavier punishment for those producing shoddy drugs.

Amendments to the Medical Product Administration Law and the Criminal Law have improved identification standards and procedures related to such crimes, prompting the need for a new judicial interpretation to ensure the law is implemented correctly, according to the Supreme People's Court and the Supreme People's Procuratorate, which jointly issued the interpretation on Friday.

"Designed to address new situations and problems created by such crimes and fully respond to the public's concerns about drug safety, the document includes comprehensive provisions on the standards for conviction and sentencing and proposes solutions to prominent practical problems with the application of the law," said Gao Jingfeng, head of the SPP's Law Policy Research Office.

It also clarified the circumstances that would require heavier punishments to be imposed, and it outlined conviction and sentencing standards for the crime of producing, selling and supplying counterfeit and inferior drugs, Gao said.

People who produce, sell or provide counterfeit drugs to pregnant women, new mothers, children and gravely ill people, or for use during natural disasters, public health crises or security incidents would also be punished harshly, according to the document.

Producers or providers of shoddy drugs that cause death or lead to 10 or more people falling ill can be sentenced to a minimum of 10 years imprisonment and could even face the death penalty, it said. The same punishments apply to those who produce, sell or provide counterfeit drugs worth more than 500,000 yuan ($79,000).

In addition, people who aid such producers or sellers will also be punished, it said.

The interpretation also has provisions for imposing fines on people involved in the crimes, Gao said.

In one case mentioned by the SPP, a criminal surnamed Wang from Puyang, Henan province, collaborated with others via telephone and sold drugs without obtaining relevant approval documents to Chongqing, the provinces of Hunan and Jiangxi, and other places from August 2009 to August 2019, with total sales exceeding 2.38 million yuan.

From June to August 2019, a local deliveryman knew about the inferior drug sales and helped Wang deliver them. During that period, the sales amounted to more than 230,000 yuan.

After testing, Puyang's market supervision administration confirmed that long-term use of the drugs could harm the health of patients. In August 2020, the Hualong district procuratorate in Puyang initiated the prosecution of people involved in the sales.

In June last year, the district court sentenced Wang to two years and 10 months imprisonment and fined him 200,000 yuan for obstructing drug management. The deliveryman was sentenced to one year and 10 months in prison and fined 20,000 yuan.

Procuratorial organs nationwide have carried out several joint operations targeting crimes related to food and drug safety with market supervision and drug administration departments since 2019. They approved the arrest of 2,485 people for violating drug safety laws, prosecuted 6,537 people and made 27 procuratorial suggestions for improving efforts to fight the crimes to related departments over the past three years.

The SPC and SPP will draw from typical drug safety cases to further interpret the law. They will also make more efforts to eliminate related crimes at the source and strengthen governance of drug safety, Gao said.