A SWINDON pharmaceutical firm is warning the public how to spot counterfeit drugs.

Wasdell, a pharmaceutical packaging specialist based in Blagrove,

Martin Tedham, chief executive of Wasdell, said: “Serialisation is making massive changes to the pharmaceutical industry across the world, however many manufacturers are not ready for the new regulations.

“From next year, consumers here in the UK will start to see QR codes printed on the boxes of their pharmaceuticals, together with the lot number, expiry date plus manufacturing information. Anyone can download the software to read these codes and with just a swipe can pull up all the information they will need to have confidence in the product.

“We have already started producing serialised products for the market. It has been estimated that 1 per cent of products sold in the EU are counterfeit, and this would be the equivalent of seven million dispensed prescriptions here in the UK.

"Serialisation should be able to stop a lot of this and we are proud to be able to offer this to our manufacturers in order to promote consumer confidence in Swindon, the rest of the UK and across the rest of the world.”