Drug counterfeiting is becoming a serious and widespread public health problem. The number of FDA open investigations into drug counterfeiting rose sharply from 2000 to 2001 and has remained high in recent years. Counterfeit drugs are not only illegal, but dangerous; they may contain little or no actual drug content, or they may contain completely different drugs with potentially toxic consequences. The problem is worldwide; it has been reported that nearly 50% of all anti-malarial drugs in Africa are thought to be counterfeit.
Direct Analysis in Real Time (DART™) offers a simple solution to screening for counterfeit drugs. DART can detect the presence or absence of drugs in medicines within seconds by simply placing the pill or medicine in front of the mass spectrometer. In combination with the AccuTOF, DART provides exact masses and accurate isotopic patterns that provide elemental compositions for known and unknown substances.