Firm Declares 48% Of Drugs In Nigeria Fake

Test conducted by the United Kingdom based British Pharmacopoeia (BP) consumed has revealed that 48 per cent of drugs being consumed in Nigerian are fake.

The figures were made public by the Deputy Director of Port Inspection in the National Agency for Food, Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), Dr Musa Umar at one-day workshop organised by the body for Patent and Proprietary Medicine Dealers in Rivers State last week in Port Harcourt. Delivering a paper titled, “health Implications of Adulterated Products  and Substandard Regulated Products, Dr Umar also said 68 per cent of drugs sold in Nigeria are not registered by the agency.

The NAFDAC official said that the situation is responsible for the increasing number of drug resistant ailments, now giving medical personnel tough time to curb.

He stressed that the efficacy of consumable drugs have been made difficult because of illegal activities of drug importers and sometimes by local manufacturers.

Dr Umar contended that high level in circulations substandard drugs is made possible by poor personnel and other corrupt officials, who make  fight against counterfeit medicines difficult to combat..

For instances, he cited the case of ‘My Pikin’ products which according to him, crept into the market and claimed the lives of over 100 children between 1988-2008.

Dr Umar while condemning the attitude of most medicine manufacturers for not adhering to specifications emphasised that substandard drugs lead to heavy loss of lives since “ effect of such drugs in the body  take time to manifest”.

Besides being substandard, he stated that most drugs that are poorly exposed give birth to contaminants of which NAFDAC is striving to check through adequate enforcement of drug and food safety, especially on additives and preservatives.

He declared, “all medicines are poisons and not all poisons are dangerous”, adding that low quality drugs have adverse effects on both economy and the people.

Since the country is still battling with the crusade to curb infections diseases, Dr Umar solicited for the support of proprietary and patent medicine dealers.

The NAFDAC deputy director said, “ medicines are not just articles of commerce and therefore they must be handled and dispensed responsibly”.

He called on the medicine dealers to collaborate with government to fight the menace of substandard drugs by adhering to NAFDAC laws and adequate storage of medicines to preserve their efficability.

Meanwhile, some members of Patent Medicine Dealers Association of Nigeria (PMDAN) have called for the establishment of a central drug store to curb the circulation of fake medicines.

An exco member of PMDAN in Rivers State , Mr Baribo Kunanwe said if the store is established, members would go and buy genuine drugs, while calling on NAFDAC to beef up activities on quacks in the state.