Theft of Boston Scientific Devices Likely an Anomaly

The theft, which happened in April, was widely reported, with the company alerting customers to keep an eye out for the devices. According to the company, the devices were labeled “sterile” despite the fact that they were never sterilized, making them a potential health risk to patients, if they ever end up being used.

Does this latest incident mean that thieves are going to turn their attention to sophisticated medical devices? Is this the beginning of a crime wave, a spree of thefts involving implantables and prosthetics?

Not likely, says Richard Lincoff, who leads the medical devices practice at business consulting firm Cognizant (Teaneck, NJ). Lincoff says that he doesn’t “hear a lot about theft in our industry” when it comes to Class II and Class III devices. “I’m sure it occurs,” he says, but by their nature, those types of products “are much more difficult to move.”

There are a number of reasons, he says, for thieves to avoid looting such devices. Because of the way they are purchased in the United States—from highly regulated and well-known sales outfits—it would be very difficult for a third-party thief to find someone willing to buy them.

This is in contrast to pharmaceuticals, which are more intensely targeted by thieves. Pharmaceuticals can be resold much more easily on a secondary market that features high levels of demand, making them much more valuable. 

“Medical devices, people don’t swallow them, they don’t give you a high, and they can be tracked, because they have serial numbers,” Lincoff says. “And they do break down, and so how are you going to get them fixed?” He points out that off-market medical devices would not, obviously, come with access to any sort of customer service.

Medical devices are also closely tracked in case they need to be recalled, which would also make them easy to recognize if they’re stolen and illicitly resold.

“Take a product like a hemoanalyzer,” Lincoff says. “If you stole one of those, well, you’re dealing with $50,000 or more of equipment. Most of the parts in there have numbers, and those numbers are associated with that particular instrument. So if you were going to sell it on the hot market, you’d have to find some sleazy lab. But once they called it in to get it fixed because those things are pretty difficult—they’d be in trouble.”

These barriers would seem to put a natural limit on the market for stolen medical devices, says Barry Tarnef, a senior risk specialist with insurance firm Chubb Group (Warren, NJ).

“I wouldn’t think that the secondary market, if you will, for stolen medical devices would be as good as the secondary market for other stolen products,” Tarnef says. “There are other things that are easier to sell, and there’s a wider range of people that want them. People looking for medical devices are probably a very small niche.”

The threat of theft is such a small concern for manufacturers of Class II and III devices, Lincoff says, that many don’t even take any kind of extra security measure to protect their supply chains.

“The best tracking that you can have is because it is an asset that must be tracked,” Lincoff says. “So the very fact that they are tracking it. . . allows them, if something would happen, to announce ‘Here’s the following numbers, and this is why they’re gone.’”

“The industry makes products that are more difficult to use, and that in itself provides some protection,” he says.

However, just because there wouldn’t seem to be an obvious reason to steal medical devices doesn’t mean companies shouldn’t at least be aware of the possibility. For instance, devices are at risk of being lifted if they’re connected to, packaged with, or even just traveling next to pharmaceuticals.

“I think that just generally speaking, probably all cargo in transit is probably almost equally vulnerable,” Tarnef says. 

“If you’ve got, let’s say, a medical device shipment that happens to be comingled with a pharmaceutical shipment, even though your product may not be the target, if the load gets stolen, your product is now out of your care, custody, and control,” Tarnef says. “So that, certainly, would be an issue.”

Devices that are meant to be consumed or are easier to sell, such as many Class I devices, would also be at risk.

Additionally, there is the possibility that a thief is not deterred by the poor market and heavy tracking of more sophisticated devices.

“I’m not sure that’s common knowledge among the cargo thieves,” Tarnef says of product tracking. “Even if it is, [thieves] might be able to find a market that might be either off-market or outside the country.” While there may not be very many people interested in buying those devices, Tarnef says, “you only need one person to buy it. So if one person has a market or can find a market for whatever you stole. . . whether it’s serialized or not, maybe they can do it.”

Whatever the motive, a theft is still a problem.

“If a load is stolen, whether it was stolen by somebody who actually actively targeted that load, or [someone] who just stole it because it was an opportunity theft, at the end of the day, does it really matter to the medical device manufacturer?” Tarnef says. “I think not.”

Medical device makers may not have to prepare for a sudden rise in theft, but Tarnef says security is still something they should pay attention to.

“How do they protect their product from physical damage?” Tarnef says. “Maybe theft and pilferage becomes another thing to think about.”

With regard to the stolen Boston Scientific devices, a company representative said there are no updates to report. A list of the stolen items, complete with pictures and serial numbers, was published shortly after the theft.