Medicines in China are to conform with new national standards, instead of different local ones as before. This will include the regulation of packaging, labeling and user information.
Officials from the State Medicines Supervision Bureau say most of the about 130 thousand medicinal specifications have passed the national certification check, about 12 thousand are waiting for further checking, and 5 thousand face cancellation.
The checking and standardization of over 2 thousand manuals for synthetic medicines, as well as all certified traditional Chinese medicines, have been ordered.
The previous lack of strict standards for medicines has led to the danger of misuse. In addition, some pharmaceutical factories have greatly exaggerated the curative effects of their products, or otherwise tried to get consumers to maximize consumption of these products.
(People's Daily December 6, 2002)
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