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This is NEWS Plus Special English.
The police in eastern China have detained over 20 people in the latest crackdown on the production and online trading of fake drugs.
The public security authorities in Zhejiang Province seized at least 20,000 boxes of fake drugs and several tons of raw materials, in the crackdown that lasted for more than three months.
The drugs were sold in almost all of the provinces across China, with total economic gains reaching 100 million yuan, roughly 16 million U.S. Dollars.
Among the best-sold fake drugs were slimming capsules and painkillers that contained banned ingredients. Most of the drugs were sold only at online stores on Wechat, China's most popular mobile messaging app.
The police said an increasing number of people complained of health problems after using the drugs.
Investigations found an illegal drug production and trading hierarchy that involved dozens of people working in Zhejiang and Guangdong provinces.
Further investigations are underway.
You are listening to NEWS Plus Special English. I'm Mark Griffiths in Beijing.
The overall number of cases of adverse drug reactions last year remained on a par with the previous year, but those involving traditional Chinese medicine injections had a noted rise.
More than 1.3 million cases of adverse drug reaction were reported in total, a year-on-year increase of almost 1 percent. Injections accounted for 61 percent of the total, up 2 percentage points.
That's according to a report released by the China Food and Drug Administration, the public health watchdog. The annual report is a key reference for safety supervision over drugs on the market.
The report revealed that traditional Chinese Medicine injections were responsible for almost 130,000 drug reaction cases, up more than 5 percent from the previous year, marking the most significant increase across all types of drugs. Among them, 7 percent were severe cases.
Medical experts say that unlike drugs taken orally or applied on the skin, Traditional Chinese Medicine injections usually have more complicated ingredients and are used together with other drugs. Improper dosage or incorrect injection-speed are very likely to induce adverse effects.
The administration has urged hospitals to exercise caution when prescribing Traditional Chinese Medicine injections, the main cause of the increasing number of drug reaction cases.
