Stolen, expired, resold: USAID watchdog breaks up Kenyan pharmacy scheme

The United States Agency for International Development, Office of Inspector General (USAID OIG) has once again stopped the theft of U.S.-funded medical items.The USAID OIG led a field operation in Kenya to find stolen medical products within the country’s commercial pharmaceutical supply chain, the agency said in a press release on September 8, 2026. The operation led to two arrests, 11 individuals compelled to report for further investigative or court proceedings, and the closure of at least four pharmacies over illegal schemes and violations of regulations.
The operation seized thousands of medical products, including more than 2,000 tablets of co-trimoxazole antibiotics and hundreds of expired, defective, or stolen tablets, capsules, and diagnostic test strips.
“Conducting investigations that have had tremendous results,” OIG says
USAID’s OIG also suspected that some of the stolen products were diverted from U.S.-funded foreign assistance and global health programs, including those under the United Nations. Some of the stolen products were also apparently intended to be sent to other countries.
The operation follows others performed by the OIG, which former USAID Inspector General Jonathan Schofield described on Just the News, No Noise last week.
“They’re not sitting in the embassy. They’re going out. They’re doing field visits and interviews and conducting investigations that have had tremendous results,” he said. “So, that is something that I think is a very, very important first step to remember in terms of how it is that foreign assistance can be protected moving forward. We have the answer. You have a really solid, experienced cadre of professionals who know how to address it.”
In that interview, Schofield recounted another incident in Africa involving malaria and AIDS medication. He said that “hundreds of millions of dollars worth of commodities” were being shipped every year from the U.S. to Africa, and organized groups began stealing the products.
Dozens of people all around Africa arrested 
“But these are criminals, so they weren’t worried too much about refrigeration. They weren’t worried about expiration dates. They wouldn’t tell people how to administer whatever the product was,” Schofield said. “So, people were continuing – could get sick and die.”
He said that the USAID OIG went into the areas where the theft was occurring and tracked the products that were being stolen and sold. Then, just as in drug busts in the U.S., agents and local law enforcement would arrest the sellers, interview them, and find their suppliers.
“Eventually, in this instance, we arrested dozens of people all around Africa. We had indictments in the United States, and we made a big impact,” he said.
Following that operation, Schofield said, the USAID OIG worked with administrators in Africa to make improvements that would make it harder for products to be stolen.

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