A federal grand jury in Houston returned an indictment charging an Indian national with selling and shipping tens of thousands of dollars’ worth of counterfeit oncology pharmaceuticals into the United States. According to court documents, Sanjay Kumar, 43, of Bihar, India, and his co-conspirators allegedly arranged for the sale and shipment of fake, counterfeit versions of oncology pharmaceuticals—including Keytruda—to individuals in the United States. Genuine Keytruda is a cancer immunotherapy that is approved in the United States for 19 different indications, including to treat certain types of melanoma, lung cancer, head and neck cancer, Hodgkin lymphoma, gastric cancer, cervical cancer, and breast cancer. Merck Sharp & Dohme LLC, formerly known as Merck Sharp & Dohme Corp., has the exclusive right to authorize the manufacture of Keytruda for introduction into interstate commerce. Kumar was arrested on June 26 in Houston after traveling to the United States to conduct further negotiations aimed at expanding his business selling fake Keytruda in the US market.
