Six foreign nationals posing as doctors among eighteen detained in one raid, and sick notes sold for RM30: Malaysia's two markets in fake medicine

Malaysia registers doctors through the Malaysian Medical Council and has a long list of recognised foreign medical schools, which gives its authorities a clear line to enforce. In 2025 they enforced it on both sides.

According to Bernama, six foreign nationals who had been posing as doctors were among 18 people detained in a single enforcement raid, the operation targeting premises offering treatment without licensed practitioners. The Malay Mail reported in July 2025 that police in Sungai Petani uncovered a syndicate selling forged documents, including medical certificates, for as little as RM30 each, after an employee's habit of producing fake sick notes drew attention.

The two stories sit at opposite ends of the same economy. At one end, people with no qualification offering clinical treatment under a doctor's title, in this case foreigners whose claimed credentials nobody had checked against the council's register. At the other, the cheapest possible medical document, a sick note, counterfeited at scale for people who want a day off. In between are the documents that matter to students: degree certificates, transcripts, equivalency letters and offer letters, which the same forgers can produce for a higher price.

Malaysia is a significant destination for medical students from across Asia and Africa, and an earlier case on this site records what happened when Malaysian agents promised Egyptian students sponsorship that never came. The Bernama raid adds the domestic warning. The council's register and its schedule of recognised qualifications are public, and a practitioner, a clinic or a college that is not on them is not legitimate however long it has been operating. Check the list, not the signboard, and for any document you are offered rather than issued, assume it came from Sungai Petani.