Förfalskade läkemedel i ett mångkulturellt samhälle. Betydelsen av kunskapsutbyte mellan allmänhet och expertis

Funded by the LMK Foundation http://lmkstiftelsen.se/projekt/ Medicines are products that most people worldwide come into contact with sometime in life. They are an obvious and rarely questioned element in existence. Against this background, the spread of counterfeit medicines is particularly problematic and involves extensive health risks to the individual. The consequences are, in the long run, high medical costs and other social costs in the form of increased burden on the judiciary. Falsified medicines and drugs are sold through intermediaries that are not authorized e.g. on the Internet or in stores / markets where permits are missing. They bring significantly higher sums of money than global illicit drug crime.In the proposed study we take the basis of Swedish society. It may be close to hand thinking that the problem with false medicines is a marginal phenomenon in Sweden. It's not like that. First of all, we ask the question of the extent to which individuals' social and cultural experiences of access to medicine may affect the attitude towards how medicines are to be procured. Which similarities or differences show different social and ethnic groups regarding their attitude to how medicines should be procured? We also want to investigate the possibilities for implementation, that is, how our results can be used as a basis for spreading knowledge to the public about wise drug/medicine handling. We want to investigate three different groups in Swedish society that are in the age range 9-12 years, so-called tweens. A common starting point for all groups is a specially designed comic magazine that addresses tweens. The series figure Annie tells about her body, its functions and about falsified medicines. The magazine’s languages are Swedish, English, Portuguese, Arabic, Farsi and Urdi, Dari. The series magazine is a product of the Uppsala Monitoring Center - WHO Collaborating Center for International Drug Monitoring (UMC), which in the context of the World Health Organization WHO works for safer drug use. Annie & Mac's adventure is the first in a series of series titles that focus on tweens. The second is followed by a number about antibiotics. Our study is conducted in cooperation with UMC. The following three groups are to be investigated:1. group of ethnic Swedish backgrounds2. group of immigrant backgrounds3. group who are new arrivals / migrantsPurpose1. Retrieve information to the public focusing on children 9-12 years old from different social and ethnic groups. We want to describe the knowledge that exists about the distinction between legal and illegal drugs, the attitude of e-commerce of medicines and the purchase of medicines abroad.2. Provide knowledge base for social organizations such as information, prevention and legislation.

Falsified medicines in a multi cultural society. Importance of knowledge exhange between the public and expterixe