Prep from India

[jdubya]

I recently had a prescription filled via TeleRx for prep and they sent me bottles from Camber Pharmaceuticals, Hetero Labs, based in India. Does anyone know if this is legit?

[viking8x6]

Yes, that's fine (my Truvada Rx came from the same place). A lot of the big manufacturers of generic pharmaceuticals are in India.

[jdubya]

Thanks for the reply. I figured I would get a lot of impulse, quick type responses, so nice to see real information. I do see some groups have studied overseas medications and their ingredients. 

[Rillion]

Pretty hard to avoid as half of all generic prescriptions drugs used in the US are manufactured in India. There was a study last year that made headlines with what looks like a shockingly high number, but it's hard to find the actual numbers to put it in context. 

The study found that generics manufactured in India had a 54% higher rate of severe adverse events reported through the self reporting system. But this study was done by US and Korean researchers of roughly 2500 generic drugs, which likely means there millions of people using these drugs. What I haven't been able to easily find is how many severe adverse events (sae) were reported by each group (developed world generics vs primarily Indian generics). Since there is roughly a 50/50 split, if out of a million people taking developed world had 100 sae's, then that means out of the group of a million people taking generics from India 154 had sae's. Or 0.01% vs 0.0154% chance. Or an additional 0.0054% chance of a sae. 

Now if instead there were 100,000 sae's out of 1 million vs 154,000, now we are taking about 5.4% increased chance of a sae. Percentage increases of percentage chances end up highly dependent on the base percentage. 

Statistically these two scenarios are similar but you'd probably choose differently:

Scenario A - pay twice as much for a drug that will only have a 10% chance of harming you versus the cheaper option which has a 15% chance of harming you.

Scenario B - pay twice as much for a drug that has a 1 in a million chance of harming you or half as much for a drug that has a 1.5 chance on a million to harm you.

 

Edited Friday at 11:32 PM by Rillion

[Tiboer]

Didn’t know about Telyrx!  Thanks 

[jdubya]

Thanks Rillion, thats what I was curious about. I see some studies out there, some reviews noting adverse effects although on other drug types from India. I've taken the real deal Gilead for years but this is whats available to me now.

[viking8x6]

Part of the trouble with those statistics is that it is a self-reporting system, and there is very likely cognitive bias in the reporting based on whether the drug is brand name or generic. Also, it includes common and well-known (although serious) side effects (e.g. kidney damage) so rare but very serious events are numerically swamped in the aggregate data.

The data (for the US) is available through the FDA's web site: https://www.fda.gov/drugs/fdas-adverse-event-reporting-system-faers/fda-adverse-event-reporting-system-faers-public-dashboard

 

[WorkJack]

On 1/17/2026 at 7:53 AM, viking8x6 said:

A lot of the big manufacturers of generic pharmaceuticals are in India.

If you want to know a bunch of medicines and prices, there is a good publication in New Zealand - the Pharmac Schedule. You need the generic chemical name, not the brand name.

You can search online for: Pharmac Schedule PDF

Note the spelling of Pharmac it can get auto corrected wrong. Click the pdf for this month. The explanation of the document is on the first four pages. It's on a .govt.nz website.

New Zelanders pay NZD$5 per medicine, plus a doctors visit fee, (about NZ$80) . Prep costs NZ$13.45 per month. (9USD.)  So we pay, 80 + 5. About US60 per 3 months. Most of the cost is the doctors visit fee. If you are in a central city, I think you can go to the sexual health clinic, for free, then pay $5 prescription fee for three month supply. The blood tests are free.