How can you save lives with Blockchain?
Do you know?
- One in 10 drugs sold in the developing world is thought to be fake/counterfeit?
- Counterfeit medicines cost Pharma industry a whopping £200bn per year.
- Up to 169,000 children may be dying every year from pneumonia because of fake drugs
Governments across the globe are also working towards reducing this menace by introducing legislation like Falsified Medicine Directive (FMD) by the European Union and US Drug Supply and Chain Security Act(USDA) track and trace regulation.
The challenge, however, is the willingness of the participating organizations to open their systems leading to lack of trust in the overall ecosystem.
Can Blockchain save some of these children? Yes, the technology can reduce the number of fake drugs entering into the supply chain, eventually saving lives. Technology provides critical features of the track/trace and immutability to ensure that drugs are only coming from authentic sources.
Let’s see how can this be implemented in a real scenario.
- Once the drug is manufactured and packed, the batch number, production date, and other information (e.g. photo of the box)about the drug are stored on the Blockchain. This data, however, is not only stored in plain text, but also as a hash of the data.
- The trick, however, is not to has the only plain text data, but also an additional field (e.g. Distributor ID) which is only known to manufacturer and distributor.
- Hence any attempt to replace the drug with a counterfeit will have to be matched with the data on the Blockchain. With all the data along with a photo of the shipment being stored as a hash will make it extremely difficult to change the load and have a perfect match with the picture taken at the manufacturer.
- The similar process can be repeated between all parties in the supply chain.
Blockchain, alone, cannot solve the problem. It will need other technologies like image recognition, artificial intelligence, and the Internet of things.
But, the Blockchain will become the backbone of the overall solution and other technologies will work around it.
There are quite a few projects in the space like FarmaTrust, MediChain, and BlockRx. But still, have to deliver a project that is production ready.
While governments are making efforts by bringing in new regulations, there is a need for the industry leaders to start participating in these initiatives and utilise the technologies to stop counterfeit drugs entering in the supply chain. Blockchain as technology is a great tool at their disposal to stop this menace.
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