Abuse is a compliance and law and order issue, says a pharma industry representative
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BRYAN WOOLSTON
In less than a week, India has found mention twice in concerns and action taken by the United States involving opioid Fentanyl.
“China remains the primary source country for illicit fentanyl precursor chemicals and pill pressing equipment, followed by India,” said an “Annual threat assessment” report of the US Intelligence community, published earlier this week.
Fentanyl abuse is a critical part of US administration’s tariff narrative against Mexico, Canada and China. And now India finds a mention in the Intel report, although this is not an isolated instance.
Just days ago, a US Department of Justice communication mentioned India-based chemical manufacturing company (Hyderabad-based Vasudha Pharma Chem Limited), and three high-level employees who were charged in a federal court in Washington, DC, “related to illegally importing precursor chemicals used to make illicit fentanyl.” The note also said, the defendants allegedly conspired to send “four metric tons of a precursor chemical to the United States and Mexico for the manufacture of Fentanyl.”
A query was emailed to Vasudha Pharma and a response is awaited.
The latest 2025 Annual Threat Assessment report is the Intelligence community’s official evaluation of threats to US citizens, and interests broad, the report said. “Nonstate groups are often enabled, both directly and indirectly, by state actors, such as China and India as sources of precursors and equipment for drug traffickers,” the Intel report said.
An industry-insider explained that pre-precursor chemical 1-(tert-Butoxycarbonyl)-4-piperidone, also called N-BOC-4-piperidone, (N-BOC-4P), is a chemical used to produce ANPP and NPP – precursors of fentanyl – and companies require a Central permit to export, these chemicals.
But pharmaceuticals is one of the segments identified by US President Trump for reciprocal tariff action, and recent fentanyl incidents and red-flags could put the industry under sharp focus, said industry-watchers.
Harish Jain, President, Federation Of Pharma Entrepreneurs, told the correspondent, “Fentanyl, Tramadol etc are extremely useful drugs in pain-management in cancer and orthopedic cases, for example. However, if there is an abuse being reported from any country, it is a compliance and law and order issue, and the whole life saving pharma industry cannot be tarred with a single brush for bad actors. Let the laws of that particular country take its own due course.”
“Fentanyl and other synthetic opioids remain the most lethal drugs trafficked into the US, causing more than 52,000 US deaths in a 12-month period ending in October 2024. This represents a nearly 33 per cent decrease in synthetic opioid-related overdose deaths compared to the same reporting time frame the previous year, according to CDC provisional data, and may be because of the availability and accessibility of naloxone,” said the US Intel report.
Published on March 28, 2025