{"id":16976,"date":"2025-03-04T15:20:09","date_gmt":"2025-03-04T13:20:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/?p=16976"},"modified":"2026-10-24T15:01:56","modified_gmt":"2026-10-24T13:01:56","slug":"expired-medicines","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/expired-medicines\/","title":{"rendered":"How Expired Medicines Became a Profitable Trade in Egypt"},"content":{"rendered":"

Rania (24 years old) did not expect that preparing for her wedding would bring her a bitter experience. While she was searching online for cosmetics and skin and hair care medicines, a tempting advertisement appeared in front of her on Facebook: the products she needed at half price. She did not hesitate much; she contacted the anonymous seller, who reassured her about the quality and effectiveness of the products. She paid EGP 1,200 via an e-wallet and waited impatiently for the parcel.<\/span><\/p>\n

Within a week of use, anxiety began to creep in. She felt repeated nausea, and a rash appeared on her skin. When she examined the dates printed on the packages, she discovered that all the products had expired more than a year earlier! She rushed to contact the commercial page, but the response came as stalling, then ignoring, and finally blocking. She realised that she had fallen victim to online fraud, and found nothing left to do but write a warning in one of the women’s groups, to alert girls not to fall into the same trap.<\/span><\/p>\n

Shaimaa did not expect that the drug “Arcalion”, which the doctor had prescribed her to relieve fatigue, would lead her to a shocking confrontation with the reality of some pharmacies in Egypt. A year ago, she bought it from a pharmacy in Maragha district in Sohag governorate. Its price was slightly lower than usual, but she did not suspect anything. A week after taking it, as she reached for the box, she noticed the expiry date: more than a year had passed since it had expired! She panicked and went back to the pharmacy demanding an explanation. Then she discovered that the seller was not a pharmacist, but merely an unlicensed assistant. He tried to evade her, but was forced to call the pharmacist after she threatened to expose the matter. The latter came in a hurry, apologised, and assured her that the medicine had lost only 10% of its effectiveness but was “not harmful”, before refunding her money. Shaimaa came away with one lesson: she would never again trust any medicine without checking its expiry date herself.<\/span><\/p>\n

But the experience was not merely a passing incident. Months later, when her seven-year-old child fell ill with a sore throat, the doctor prescribed him an antibiotic. Her husband went to another pharmacy and came back home with it. Shaimaa, who had become more cautious, examined the box immediately. The surprise: the medicine had expired six months earlier! She wondered: what if she had not checked? What if her child had taken the medicine? She realised that the problem was not in a single pharmacy, but in a larger system lacking oversight, where expired medicines are sold without deterrence, while patients pay the price.<\/span><\/p>\n

According to previous statements<\/a> by the head of the Pharmaceuticals Division, Ali Ouf, unlicensed factories are spreading in Egypt that buy expired medicines from pharmacies, then repackage them with fake dates and put them back on the market, exposing consumers’ lives to grave danger. Ouf added that the Consumer Protection Agency had, during the past period, seized violating factories that recycle some oncology drugs by removing the expired date and printing a new one before distributing them through warehouses and pharmacies, noting that the size of this illicit trade is estimated at about EGP 3 billion.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Despite the seriousness of the phenomenon, Ouf revealed that pharmaceutical companies have not withdrawn their expired medicines from the market for seven years, which exacerbates the crisis and gives the informal market wider space. In an attempt to curb the spread of this phenomenon, Dr Khaled Abdel Ghaffar, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Health and Population, issued<\/a> a decision last February obliging medical facilities to return expired medicines and medical supplies to the supplying companies, and prohibiting their destruction except after completing the necessary legal procedures and obtaining the approval of the competent authorities. Nevertheless, the question remains as to the extent to which the decision can regulate the market and confront this trade, which is constantly expanding.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Recommended reading: <\/b>A Deadly Injection… How Did Antibiotics Become a Danger Threatening Egyptians’ Lives?<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

\nMedicines in Popular Markets<\/b><\/h1>\n

In recent months, Zeinab found herself in a whirlpool of searching for blood pressure and diabetes medicines for her elderly mother, to no avail. Every time she went to the health insurance, she came back with the same answer: <\/span>“The treatment is not available”<\/span><\/i>. In pharmacies, the price had doubled, and sometimes the medicine was not available at all. She did not have the luxury of buying it on the black market, as her late husband’s pension is barely enough to secure food and pay the electricity and water bills.<\/span><\/p>\n

But one day, while she was wandering through the Wekalet El-Balah market in Bulaq Abu El-Ela, her attention was caught by a scene she had not been familiar with before: a woman sitting on the pavement, with boxes and strips of medicine of all kinds spread out in front of her, shouting at passers-by: <\/span>“Any strip of medicine for five pounds, and any box for ten”<\/span><\/i>. She stopped for a few moments and hesitated, but she remembered that the same medicines are sold at the Friday Market. She did not ask about the source, she did not think about the expiry date; all that came to her mind was her mother, who badly needs this medicine. She paid the money, carried the boxes placed inside a black plastic bag, and left the market, reassured that she had found a solution, without realising that she might have bought a new danger.<\/span><\/p>\n

At a time when Zeinab, like a wide segment of poor families in Egypt (whose purchasing power has declined because of the economic crisis, the devaluation of the local currency to about EGP 50.60 to the dollar and the rise in inflation, which registered 23.3% in December 2024 according to Central Bank data<\/a>, and which have been forced to cut<\/a> spending on health by 43% and to resort to low-quality brands by 70%), did not care about the expiry date of the medicines of unknown origin that she bought from the market, a young man took a photo of medicines being sold in the street at the Sunday Market in Wekalet El-Balah, without oversight, and published the photo<\/a> on 19 January last via the “Threads” platform, revealing that he had noticed expired medicine packages.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

His post and the photo of the medicines quickly spread across social media, and days after the incident, the Egyptian Drug Authority <\/span>announced<\/span><\/a>, on 27 January last, that, together with the relevant security agencies, it had managed to arrest a group of people in a market within Cairo governorate in possession of quantities of expired vitamins and cosmetics. This was based on what had been monitored in multiple complaints and on a number of social media sites and news websites and platforms that had circulated information and photos showing medicines being sold outside licensed pharmacies by a number of non-pharmacists in a public market in Cairo, in addition to complaints received by the Egyptian Drug Authority indicating the circulation of medicines and cosmetics outside licensed pharmaceutical establishments.<\/span><\/p>\n

The authority revealed that it had launched joint campaigns on the market, which is held one day a week, and that a group of people had been arrested within Cairo governorate, “the subject of the report”, who are not qualified to practise the pharmacy profession and were in charge of selling those products. Quantities of cosmetics, skin care products and other controlled products were seized, and quantities of various vitamins were also seized in their possession, in addition to small quantities of pharmaceutical products. Unregistered products and expired food supplements were also seized, and the total number of packages seized reached nearly 700 packages, most of which did not show an expiry date. The seized items were taken into custody and six reports were drawn up for presentation to the competent prosecution to take the necessary action.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Recommended reading: <\/b>Who Controls Egyptians’ Medicine? The Black Market Takes Centre Stage<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

\nThe Trade in Expired Medicines<\/b><\/h1>\n

Zawia3<\/span><\/i> documented the spread of an active trade in expired medicines through <\/span>Facebook<\/span><\/i> groups dedicated to trading these medicines, as well as pages and accounts belonging to unknown entities claiming to work in the pharmaceutical field, such as <\/span>Life Pharm, Al-Hamd Pharma, Al-Mostafa, Overseas for Expiry Exchange<\/span><\/i>. Representatives of these entities, in addition to anonymous accounts, publish posts within groups dedicated to pharmacy and the medicine trade in Egypt, in which they offer to buy packs of infant formula, food supplements, cosmetics and damaged medicines that distribution companies refuse to take back. This is done in exchange for replacing them with other products, such as sexual stimulants (<\/span>Viagra, Erec, Virecta, Nabi Vit<\/span><\/i>) or pharmacy supplies (<\/span>syringes, toothbrushes<\/span><\/i>), in addition to common medicines such as (<\/span>Panadol, Cataflam, Bi-Alcofan, Dexa, Zorcal, Oplex, fruit effervescent salts, lozenges, Vitacid C<\/span><\/i>).<\/span><\/p>\n

Although some pharmacists reject these offers and bear the financial losses resulting from destroying expired medicines, others respond to the representatives and conclude deals to sell these medicines at discounts of up to 75% or to exchange them for other products. Some of them search within pharmacy groups for buyers of these medicines, either for money after a large discount, or to exchange them for products that generate profit for the pharmacy.<\/span><\/p>\n

Pharmacist <\/span>Hanaa Mohamed<\/span><\/i> tells <\/span>Zawia3<\/span><\/i> that medicine distribution companies take back only 1% of the value of pharmacies’ monthly purchases, on condition that the pack is complete, which pushes pharmacists to reduce their purchases to avoid losses. Some of them also try to sell medicines close to expiry as substitutes for medicines in high demand. As for medicines that cannot be sold off, they are disposed of by throwing them in the rubbish, or sold to representatives who offer to buy them at large discounts or to exchange them for other products.<\/span><\/p>\n

Hanaa<\/span><\/i> warns that these medicines, once they leave pharmacies, are often traded illegally, being sold directly to patients through intermediaries, away from official channels. Pharmacies are supposed to obtain medicines from licensed sources, such as distribution companies, but some non-compliant pharmacists may resort to buying medicines from illegal warehouses known as <\/span>“under-the-stairs factories”<\/span><\/i>.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Egyptian medicine market contains about 17,000 pharmaceutical products produced by around 170 medicine factories. Despite the rise in the prices<\/a> of nearly 400 medicines, by rates ranging between 20 and 30% for medicines treating chronic diseases and between 30 and 50% for non-essential and seasonal medicines, the market recorded sales<\/a> in Egypt estimated at about EGP 215 billion during 2024, compared with EGP 154.7 billion in 2023, an increase of about 40%, according to estimates by the head of the Pharmaceuticals Division at the Federation of Egyptian Chambers of Commerce, Ali Ouf, who expected<\/a>, in previous press statements, that the Egyptian Drug Authority would raise the prices of only about 1,000 products in the whole of 2025.<\/p>\n

The number of pharmacists in Egypt is estimated at 213,000 pharmacists working in 80,000 pharmacies. According to the World Health<\/a> Organization, the ratio of pharmacists to citizens in Egypt is one pharmacist for every 438 citizens, while the global rate reaches one pharmacist for every 1,100\u20131,600 individuals or 23 pharmacists for every 10,000 citizens, and the global rate is 6\u20139 pharmacists for every 10,000 individuals. As for pharmacies, the rate in Egypt is one pharmacy for every 1,261 citizens, while the global rate reaches one pharmacy for every 3,500\u20135,000 individuals.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

Recommended reading: <\/strong>The Government Restricts the Right to Health: A New Regulation Takes Us Backwards<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

The Drug Authority’s Moves<\/b><\/h1>\n

Mahmoud Fouad, executive director of the Egyptian Center for the Protection of the Right to Medicine, affirms to Zawia3 that the crisis of expired medicines is not new, as countries around the world have been facing it since the 1970s. But while most countries set strict regulations for the safe disposal of these medicines, the problem persists in Egypt because of the influence of pharmaceutical companies, which refuse to take back expired medicines from pharmacies, using as a pretext missing strips from the boxes or the absence of official invoices.<\/span><\/p>\n

Exacerbating the problem is that many small pharmacies rely on buying medicines from informal warehouses without obtaining invoices, which deprives them of dealing directly with the large distribution companies. In addition, some commercial pharmaceutical companies, which do not belong to the Chamber of Pharmaceutical Industry or the Federation of Industries, resort to closing their commercial registers and freezing their activity to evade taxes, which makes it impossible for pharmacists to contact them to return damaged medicines. In contrast, foreign and multinational companies are committed to taking back their medicines after they expire. In 2019, the centre estimated the volume of expired medicines in the Egyptian market at about EGP 500 million.<\/span><\/p>\n

Fouad points out that Egypt has about 80,000 pharmacies, of which 15,000 are owned by people who do not belong to the profession or who impersonate pharmacists, and these seek to make a profit by any means, which pushes them to deal with gangs specialised in buying expired medicines at reduced prices. These medicines are transferred to illegal workshops, where they are repackaged with newly printed production dates, then sold again to pharmacies, which deceives pharmacists and consumers alike.<\/span><\/p>\n

Security reports confirm that the Ministry of Interior carries out periodic campaigns to raid these workshops and arrest those involved. Fouad attributes the deaths of 13 citizens in 2022 to the use of expired or counterfeit medicines, noting that the centre received a complaint from a woman who sent photos of medicines being sold in one of the popular markets. Through a joint investigation between the Drug Authority and the security agencies, an organised network trading in expired medicines was uncovered, run by several vendors inside the market, which constitutes a direct threat to citizens’ health.<\/span><\/p>\n

In this context, the Egyptian Drug Authority announced a new initiative to withdraw expired medicines from pharmacies, which is supposed to be implemented in the coming period to curb this dangerous phenomenon.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Egyptian Drug Authority had launched an initiative<\/a> on 25 September 2024 aimed at disposing of expired medicines and organising the process of withdrawing pharmaceutical products from the market in a safe and effective way, with a focus on protecting consumers from potential health harm resulting from the use of expired medicines and products, and a warning to citizens against buying medicines from unreliable sources or at prices different from the fixed compulsory price, as expired medicines do not only lose their effectiveness but may lead to poisoning or dangerous drug interactions that put consumers’ lives at risk.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

On 28 February 2025, the Egyptian Drug Authority <\/span>revealed<\/span><\/a> the <\/span>details of Decision<\/span><\/a> No. 47 of 2025 on the withdrawal of products from the Egyptian medicine market upon their expiry, explaining that Article Two stipulates that companies are obliged to accept returns of the expired products they produced or imported, in the smallest production units, from pharmacies, stores or warehouses, going back along the supply chain to its beginning, within 90 days from the date this decision comes into force, provided that they are sorted within 30 days from the date of their receipt, and that compensation for the returned products is settled within a maximum of 180 days from the date this decision comes into force. Article Four obliges factories to destroy returned products within 40 days counted from the date of their receipt of the products, and importing companies and toll-manufacturing companies are likewise obliged to destroy their returned products within 40 days counted from the date on which the store or warehouse notifies the company of its receipt of the expired products.<\/span><\/p>\n

According to Article Five of the decision, compensation for returned and accepted products is calculated on the basis of what was agreed in the aforementioned joint document for withdrawing products upon their expiry, while Article Six stipulates that the matter of companies refusing to apply the provisions of this decision shall be referred urgently to the head of the Central Administration of Operations, under a reasoned report from the distributors setting out the reasons for the refusal and the company’s justifications (if any), so that the appropriate legal measures can be taken. Article Seven obliges pharmaceutical establishments to destroy the expired products they hold, in accordance with the provisions of the law and its executive regulations and the rules and procedures for destroying products in force in this regard, under the supervision of Egyptian Drug Authority inspectors, at the expense of the pharmaceutical establishment. According to Article Eight, companies are obliged, as soon as the period specified in Article Two of this decision ends, to accept the expired returns of the pharmaceutical establishment, provided that the invoice for the products subject to the return request is submitted and that the remaining shelf life of the product is (6 months) six months from the date the return request is submitted . <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Recommended reading: <\/b>Medicine Haemorrhage… The Dollar Shortage Threatens Egyptians’ Health<\/b>
\n<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

The Safe Disposal of Medicines<\/b><\/h1>\n

Dr <\/span>Islam Anan<\/b>, CEO of Aksit for Pharmaceutical and Health Research and professor of pharmacoeconomics and epidemiology at the faculties of pharmacy of Ain Shams and Misr universities, believes that the safety of how medicines are kept is more important than their expiry date, as they can spoil even while still within their validity because of temperatures and poor storage. He warns against using expired medicines, in some of which the active substance turns into a different substance that may turn into a poison, such as antibiotics, while other medicines lose part of their effectiveness in treatment. He advises consumers to dispose of them in the rubbish, after destroying them, as soon as the expiry date passes or a week or two after opening the pack, if this is written on the medicine’s prescription, especially drops and antibiotics, which most citizens leave in their refrigerators for months or years, and to go back to the pharmacist to dispose of ready-made injections.<\/span><\/p>\n

Anan, speaking to Zawia3, points out that there was a period of drought in medicine stocks in 2024 because of medicine shortages, but this does not mean there are no expired medicines. While some companies take back their expired medicines, there are charities that have recently started collecting expired medicines from consumers and returning them to the companies that produced them for disposal, so that they do not fall into the hands of representatives working illegally and end up in medicine counterfeiting factories, stressing the need not to buy any medicine from the internet or from an unofficial medicine outlet.<\/span><\/p>\n

At a time when the Egyptian Drug Authority has announced its initiative to withdraw expired medicines from pharmacies, in parallel with security and regulatory campaigns to inspect pharmacies and seize unlicensed medicine warehouses and factories that recycle those medicines and sell them to the public, experts see the need to solve the problem at its roots by creating legislation and regulations obliging pharmaceutical companies to take them back and dispose of them safely, in addition to raising citizens’ awareness of the dangers of expired medicines and of buying medical supplies online and from popular markets, to which some resort amid the economic crisis and rising medicine prices.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With the worsening economic crisis and the absence of oversight, the trade in expired medicines is flourishing in Egypt, from social media to pharmacies and popular markets. A Zawia3 investigation reveals the details of a secret network selling illusions to Egyptians and putting their lives at risk.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":11952,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[410],"tags":[],"kateb":[1550],"class_list":["post-16976","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-investigations-en","kateb-aya-yasser"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/\u0627\u0644\u062f\u0648\u0627\u0621-.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16976","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16976"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16976\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24018,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16976\/revisions\/24018"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16976"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16976"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16976"},{"taxonomy":"kateb","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/kateb?post=16976"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}