The safety of Australian medicines is under question with lax regulation here allowing the sale of drugs that are banned in the US and Canada.

Up to 20 medicines made in India for Canadian pharmaceutical company Apotex — which supplies a fifth of Australia’s generic medicines — have been banned overseas because of “significant concerns”.

But our medicine watchdog is allowing them into Australia.

Checks by the US FDA found the company which makes antibiotics, blood pressure, asthma, pills and a generic viagra was manipulating quality testing data.

It moved to ban imports from the factories in April, Canadian regulators banned the products in September.

The pharmaceutical company supplies medicines that make up around 18 per cent of the Australian generic medicine market.

For more details, go to: http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/health/medicines-banned-from-the-us-and-canada-are-on-sale-in-australia/story-fneuz9ev-1227100145729