Police have referred to prosecutors a doctor who illegally administered psychotropic drugs by stealing the identities of some 3,400 foreign patients, along with the pharmacists who sold the drugs.
Seoul Gangnam Police Station said on the 9th that it had referred a female director in her 40s and a male doctor in his 40s at a dermatology clinic in Gangnam to prosecutors under detention on the 25th of last month on charges of large-scale abuse of psychotropic drugs. On the 30th of last month, police also referred 13 people without detention, including employees of the clinic and pharmacists involved in the case.
According to the police investigation, the director and the doctor, who were addicted to sleeping pill-class psychotropic drugs, used the personal information of approximately 3,400 foreign patients who had visited the clinic without authorization and falsified 4,331 prescriptions from March last year to January this year. They then asked an employee at a large pharmacy in Seoul to arrange purchases from pharmacists working there, buying 121,849 psychotropic pills, which they each took.
The two also face charges of secretly taking propofol stored in the safe of the clinic they operated and administering it to themselves after side effects from consuming large quantities of sleeping pills made further consumption impossible.
The pharmacists at the pharmacy, who were also apprehended in the case, were found to have sold the drugs without questioning the authenticity of the poorly filled-out prescriptions in other people's names that the suspects brought in large quantities. They were even found to have sold large quantities without prescriptions at prices higher than the standard rate.
The investigation began when a foreign patient reported to police that psychotropic drugs had been prescribed under his or her stolen identity.
"Purchasing or taking psychotropic drugs under another person's name is a serious criminal act," police said. "Anyone who finds that psychotropic drugs have been prescribed under their stolen identity should immediately report it to the police." Police added, "We will continue to investigate the entire distribution and administration of medical narcotics to ensure that medical narcotics are not abused."
