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Helping Patients Find Safe Online Pharmacies
Finding safe online pharmacies and pharmacy-related websites can be difficult. In an effort to provide consumers with an easy way to identify legitimate online pharmacies among the ever-growing number of rogue internet drug outlets, the .Pharmacy Top-Level Domain Program was created by the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy® (NABP®). What is a domain? You have probably noticed “.com” and “.biz” in website addresses/URLs; both of these are examples of domains. However, .pharmacy (pronounced “dot pharmacy”) is different!
The .pharmacy domain is verified, which means that websites must be evaluated against a set of core safety standards to be granted the initial and continued use of the domain. As Canada moves to a practice model of interprovincial prescription filling and patient care, the .pharmacy domain can help provide assurances that online pharmacies are safe and properly licensed.
Let’s go back to the rogue internet drug outlets issue. Did you know that 20* new illegal pharmacies appear on the internet every day? Out of nearly 11,500 websites selling prescription drugs reviewed by NABP, the Association has found that 96% are operating illegally. This is a great risk to public health because it is very likely that consumers searching for places to buy prescription medication online will go to an unsafe website. In addition, 89% of websites found to be Not Recommended by NABP are selling medication without a prescription.
It is important for trustworthy pharmacy websites to be able to show that they are safe in a glance. Simply seeing “.pharmacy” in a URL lets consumers know that a website has undergone a review and approval process that puts patient safety first. When NABP became the official registry for .pharmacy, the Association worked with international pharmacy regulators and organizations – including the National Association of Pharmacy Regulatory Authorities (NAPRA) – to ensure that the domain would enhance public safety around the globe. Canadian consumers can be assured that .pharmacy websites are dispensing medication approved by Health Canada.
Google, Yahoo!, and Bing consider .pharmacy websites automatically eligible to advertise on their search engines and Visa recognizes .pharmacy websites as legitimate pharmacy merchants, thanks to the level of verification required to obtain a .pharmacy domain. The .pharmacy domain cannot be transferred or resold once an organization or company purchases it. This ensures that .pharmacy domains stay with the approved domain name holder; eliminating the chance for the domain to get into the wrong hands.
As the health care industry adapts to patients’ needs to interact online, it is important to preserve the integrity of the practice of pharmacy. Helping consumers find safe online pharmacies is as easy as telling patients to look for .pharmacy in URLs. If they see “pharmacy” to the right of the dot, they are in good hands. To learn more about .pharmacy and the threats that consumers face when buying medication online, visit www.safe.pharmacy.
*Center for Safe Internet Pharmacies
Carmen A. Catizone, MS, RPh, DPh
Carmen A. Catizone is the executive director of the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy® (NABP®) and the secretary of the Association’s Executive Committee. NABP is the independent, international, and impartial association that assists its member boards and jurisdictions for the purpose of protecting the public health. Carmen is involved in a variety of leadership roles with several pharmacy organizations. He has also acted as a reviewer on several advisory boards, in addition to providing expert witness testimony and consultation in the areas of pharmacy practice and regulation.