Economics plays a central role in shaping people's views, preferences, choices, and decisions. It can even be said that the concepts of trade and money has already taken root in the collective human psyche. Even something as precious and critical as a person's health often has to bend against the whirlwind of economic concerns. For a vast majority of the population, the existence of cheap generic drugs as substitutes for their more expensive branded counterparts saves both their health and their pockets. The fact that the generic and branded variants differ only in name has made a number of people more willing to go for cheap generic drugs. However, consumers should be aware that low prices can sometimes be a sign of a well-designed scam. Recently, there has been a small wave of cheap generic drugs being sold on the Internet that are nothing more than elaborately packaged sugar pills.

It is true that genuine generics are the same as their branded counterparts. When it comes down to it, both of them work using the same active ingredient and treat the same problems. However, the problem lies in the possibility of getting fake drugs delivered to your doorstep. The medical community has been using placebos for a long time now, usually for research or testing purposes, but also to placate the many medical woes of the occasional hypochondriac. Yet, when cheap generic drugs are actually little more than sugar pills, that invites more trouble than most people would believe. Unfortunately, these situations have become more common than the average consumer should be comfortable with. What's worse is that this particular scam is slowly starting to spread.

Just recently, French authorities seized a shipment of fake, generic anti-impotence pills. The shipment was noted by captured smugglers to be a small one, yet it had an estimated total of 224,000 pills. These drugs often make their way into a person's medicine cabinet by being sold over the Internet, where it is exceedingly easy to sell stuff like this and manage to get away clean as a whistle. Prior to that, Spanish authorities reportedly busted an illegal syndicate that was selling tampered birth control medication. There have been many more incidents of this variety, which don't even take into account the cheap, but theoretically less effective, drugs that are being exported en masse by a number of Chinese pharmaceutical companies.

While there have been no reports of these fake medications being purchased from a real pharmacy or drug store, they are known to be prevalent over the Internet. There are ways to tell if an online pharmacy is legitimate, such as looking for signs or seals that note verification from trusted business authorities. Another sign that a pharmacy is legitimate would be the contact information. By all rights, a legitimate company is required by most countries to put up a mailing address, an e-mail address, and a contact number for their customers. The presence of such information is no guarantee that a website is legitimate, but it can help in verifying a site's authenticity. The rule of thumb is that if you can't contact anyone via the phone line, or if you get through a little too easily, then the website is most likely a scam.