ArticleManagerSource: CCTV News Client
High-tech medical equipment has played an important role in more accurate diagnosis and treatment, and some criminals have started the idea of smuggling old medical equipment for profit. The Fuzhou Customs Anti-Smuggling Bureau recently cracked down a criminal gang that smuggled old medical gastrointestinal scopes.
The criminal gang smuggled 418 used gastrointestinal scopes, worth 20 million
With the cooperation of the Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Shantou Customs Anti-Smuggling Bureaus and local police, the Fuzhou Customs Anti-Smuggling Bureau has carried out simultaneous arrest and investigation operations in Fujian and Guangdong respectively.
This is a den hidden by smuggling gangs in a small district of Putian City. Although it is called a network office, it is a medical device company in Hangzhou, Zhejiang.
Chen Weibin, Deputy Director of the Office of the Putian Branch of the Anti-Smuggling Bureau of Fuzhou Customs:
There is a shelf on the left side of the office with some accessories for medical equipment, a handle shell for the gastrointestinal scope, a conical sleeve, and some accessories scattered.
In the den, five criminal suspects were arrested by the customs anti-smuggling police. The head of the company, surnamed Wu, is also the leader of a gang that smuggles old medical equipment. A group of customs anti-smuggling police arrested Wu, who was about to drive out.
Lin Heping, deputy director of the Putian Branch of the Anti-Smuggling Bureau of Fuzhou Customs:
Since April 2018, Wu has successively purchased second-hand medical equipment from Japanese (business) old medical equipment companies, which are all gastrointestinal scopes.
Inside the office is a warehouse stacked with dozens of gastroscope parts such as borescopes, hemostatic clips, and display screens that have not yet been unboxed. Not far from this den, there is also a warehouse of Wu’s gang, which has many parts of gastrointestinal endoscopy equipment that have not yet been opened, and the police opened a cardboard box and found that the endoscope inside had obvious traces of use.
We see that the outer packaging of these accessories is new, looks like a new product, and when we open the outer packaging, we can see that the accessories are rusty.
A total of 13 suspects were arrested in this operation. After preliminary investigation, the smuggling gang was suspected of smuggling a total of 418 old gastrointestinal scopes, with an initial estimated case value of more than 20 million yuan.
Gastroscope parts are piled up all over the floor and the maintenance workshop is dirty and messy
According to reports, among these smuggled second-hand medical equipment, because of frequent failures, smugglers also set up a special maintenance workshop. Precision medical equipment maintenance should have very high professional requirements, but what does the so-called repair workshop of smuggling gangs look like?
Walking into the offices of the companies involved, the so-called repair workshop is inside the glass door on the left.
The environment of the maintenance workshop can be described in one sentence as dirty, messy, and poor.
This workbench is cluttered with gastrointestinal scope parts, screwdrivers, needle-nose pliers and other tools, and the only precision maintenance equipment is this microscope. The criminal gang hired two technicians to overhaul the smuggled medical equipment and provide after-sales service to customers.
These black tubes are replaced endoscopes with a camera at the top that are inserted into the patient’s body to diagnose diseases.
Criminal suspect Chen:
I don’t care if it’s new or not, I just fix it, make it good for the old one, and repair it with the bad one.
According to the suspect’s account, if the two identical equipment smuggled in are faulty, there are also cases where the two are put together.
Since the quality of these smuggled old medical equipment is difficult to guarantee, even if it is sold to customers, there are a large number of repairs.
The office whiteboard shows that many domestic customers ship equipment with water leaks and abnormal images here for repair. In May this year, a private hospital in Putian purchased five gastrointestinal scopes from the company and complained to the local authorities about quality problems.
Yang Hua, deputy section chief of the second section of the anti-smuggling bureau of Fuzhou Customs:
Under the banner of a maintenance point, it is announced as a designated after-sales service,
In fact, their equipment does not meet our national technical indicators at all, and has not undergone health inspection and quarantine, so it will cause great health harm to patients.
The risk of missing diagnosis and misdiagnosis of old medical equipment is prohibited by the state
During the review, the customs anti-smuggling department found that since April 2018, Wu’s smuggling criminal gang has successively ordered used medical equipment such as gastrointestinal scopes from two Japanese companies, and then smuggled these equipment into the country and sold them to private hospitals in 15 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities, including Fujian, Jiangxi and Shanghai, for profit.
In order to smuggle these old medical equipment, the criminal suspect Wu has successively registered a number of shell companies in Putian, Fujian, Hangzhou, Zhejiang and other places, and then in the name of these companies, he purchased gastrointestinal scopes eliminated from hospitals from two companies in Japan that distributed second-hand medical equipment.
They first asked the Japanese supplier to send the goods to a designated warehouse in Hong Kong for collection, and then they contacted a professional smuggling and customs clearance gang before smuggling the equipment from Hong Kong to Shenzhen.
China prohibits the import of used medical equipment
Therefore, the old equipment smuggled by Wu’s gang was sold to private hospitals. After verification, Wu’s gang successively in the name of six medical device companies under his hand,
These old medical equipment are sold to hundreds of private hospitals in 15 provinces and 18 cities in China, including Fujian, Zhejiang and Yunnan.
An account book found by the customs anti-smuggling police in the company involved in the case densely recorded the accounts of customers in various places to purchase used medical equipment. The suspect said that everything that was crossed out with a red pen was paid in full, and those that were not crossed out were in arrears.
Some of them were 20,000 or 30,000 pieces of equipment, which he sold for more than 100,000 yuan, the premium was several times, and the customs declaration documents and commodity inspection certificates provided were all forged.
In the company involved, the customs anti-smuggling police also found forged customs declaration documents during the search.
According to the anti-smuggling department of customs, medical equipment is related to the life safety of the broad masses of the people, and the state has a strict supervision system for medical equipment.
Yu Pinggui, Director of the Anti-Smuggling Division of Fuzhou Customs:
Second-hand medical equipment smuggled into the country evades a series of national supervision of medical equipment, and there is a huge risk of missing diagnosis and misdiagnosis, and its use will cause serious harm to the people.
Chen Weibin, Deputy Director of the Office of the Putian Branch of the Anti-Smuggling Bureau of Fuzhou Customs:
Chen Weibin, Deputy Director of the Office of the Putian Branch of the Anti-Smuggling Bureau of Fuzhou Customs:
Lin Heping, deputy director of the Putian Branch of the Anti-Smuggling Bureau of Fuzhou Customs:
Yang Hua, deputy section chief of the second section of the anti-smuggling bureau of Fuzhou Customs: