Pfizer suffered the theft of a full truckload of drugs en route to a CVS facility in Rhode Island earlier this month. The $66,000 robbery involves nearly 400 cases of a variety of generics.
The trailer was taken May 14 while parked at a secure yard in Jackson, TN, reports SecuringPharma. The trade publication says the robbery provides further evidence that drug shipments are being targeted by criminal gangs.
For such gangs, which have recently been described as becoming better organized and more sophisticated in their targeting tactics, this was a lightweight heist. Perhaps despite their organizational skills, the thieves were unaware of the generics price differential.
The robbery pales next to the $37 million worth of Eli Lilly insulin stolen from a Pennsylvania truck stop in 2009, and the $11.8 million in Teva MS treatment taken that same year from an unsecured lot in New Jersey.
For Pfizer, it's the second recent trailer theft. In a mid-March job in Russia, thieves made off with two loaded trucks--and the drivers. The drivers were found unharmed a few days later, as were the empty tucks.
- here's the article
Special Report: Top 10 Pharma Cargo Thefts by Value, 2009/2010