See through the "poisoned arrow" of overseas medical fraud
Tokimoto
The much-anticipated "Zhejiang Mega Overseas Medical Fraud Case" has recently been sentenced.
The court sentenced the first defendant Zhang Moumei to life imprisonment for fraud in the first instance, and the other three principal offenders were sentenced to more than ten years in prison.
At present, the first defendant in the case has appealed and the second instance procedure has been initiated.
This case was once the largest overseas medical fraud case involving the police cracked across the country.
The organizer of the gang, Dalian Silland, and its related persons in charge, were prosecuted for suspected fraud, involving more than 400 million yuan.
(April 22, "Beijing Youth Daily")
The reason why this case has reached the "extraordinary" level is mainly because of the seriousness of the case.
In addition, some other bad and bold practices are also important reasons for the "extra-large" level. The main drug "Cancer Shield" involved in the case is one of them.
The name "Cancer Shield" is very deceptive.
Because it is not a "shield" against cancer, but a "poisonous arrow" shot at domestic patients.
The product is independently developed by a company in Shanghai, and its purchase unit price is about 2.34 yuan/piece. The main ingredients are lycopene and cyanocyanin, which can only improve immunity to a certain extent.
However, the company involved painted it in different colors, corresponding to different models of oral "cancer shield", and each box could be priced as high as tens of thousands of yuan. One of the most expensive models sold for 398,000 yuan per box.
The huge profits of each box of medicines and the number of victims are very rare.
If the entire fraud process takes place in China, since the true content of the "cancer shield" is not difficult to find out, such a blatant fraud will be easily exposed, and the case will not develop to such an extent.
However, because overseas medical fraud involves multiple countries and some criminal suspects are still overseas, it is not only difficult to obtain evidence, but also difficult to implement law enforcement cooperation.
In addition, the deceived person was unfamiliar with his place at the time. Even if he knew he was deceived, but because it was difficult to preserve the evidence and report to the police in time, he could only suffer a dumb loss.
These characteristics of overseas medical fraud have made scammers more confident.
Because of this, in recent years, overseas medical fraud cases have occurred frequently, and it is not a single case that they have reached the mega-level.
As early as 2018, the Zhuzhou police in Hunan detected a fraud case under the guise of overseas medical treatment. This was also the first case in the country where overseas medical treatment was used to falsify medical conditions.
The case involved 26 provinces across the country, with 1,731 victims, and the amount involved was 650 million.
Small-scale overseas medical scams such as organizing tourists to perform cosmetic surgery overseas, grouping of wealthy individuals to "one-shot life", and overseas anti-cancer tours have become common forms of overseas medical scams.
In recent years, the number of people participating in "overseas medical care" has been increasing year by year, and the market scale of overseas medical care has continued to rise.
Data show that from 2012 to 2017, the scale of my country's overseas medical intermediary service market showed a rapid growth trend.
In 2017, the scale of my country's overseas medical intermediary service market was around 4.559 billion yuan, and in 2018 it reached 5.1 billion yuan.
There are not a few people involved in overseas medical treatment, but there are many fraudsters lurking around them, making overseas medical treatment a risky journey and even a nightmare.
Similar cases are of great warning significance, especially for combating medical fraud.
It is imperative to strengthen overseas medical supervision. In addition to continuing to intensify the crackdown so that every case cannot be escaped by chance, it is also necessary to strengthen publicity and guidance to help the public uncover the "cancer shield" and other disguised nets to expose its "drug". The true face of "Arrow" will raise the public's vigilance and recognition ability, and build a dam for preventing overseas medical fraud from the root.