Police in China have detained five current and former employees of British drugmaker AstraZeneca Plc for questioning about potential illegal activities, according to people familiar with the matter, Bloomberg has reported.
The individuals being held are all Chinese citizens who marketed cancer drugs in AstraZeneca’s oncology division, the people said, asking not to be identified discussing private information. The investigation, according to Bloomberg, is being led by police in the southern metropolis of Shenzhen, and the detentions took place earlier in the summer, the people said.
The investigations are a potential setback for the global pharmaceuticals giant, which is deeply entrenched in China, Bloomberg said. AstraZeneca executives have publicly expressed their confidence in the Chinese market, even as heightened geopolitical tensions have caused other multinational companies to take a more cautious view on the world’s second largest economy.
The UK-based drugmaker was previously taken to task by Chinese authorities in 2022 for allegedly tampering with the gene-testing results of cancer patients to make treatment eligible for reimbursement by China’s state-run medical insurance. AstraZeneca said at the time that it had taken disciplinary action against some employees.
The investigation into AstraZeneca’s sales practices comes amid an ongoing crackdown on drug smuggling in China, Bloomberg added. While Beijing has launched regulatory reforms over the years to speed up reviews of life-saving medicines, some new therapies are either still not available in China, or approved much later than in other developed nations. That has forced patients to find drugs from outside China, sometimes through illegal channels.
While China allows patients to seek therapies it hasn’t approved from other jurisdictions, it’s illegal to bring unauthorized medicines into China for sale. It’s unclear if AstraZeneca employees facilitated the importation of the yet-to-be approved liver cancer drug, called Imjudo, into the country.