BY SOLA OGUNDIPE

THe Pharmaceutical Society of Nigeria, PSN, has called the attention of government and Nigerians at larged to the shortcomings of anti-counterfeiting technologies introduced by the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control, NAFDAC, in adequately tackling the menace of fake, counterfeit and substandard drugs in the country.

Speaking in Lagos at a press conference to herald the 2nd World Pharmacists’ Day, President of the PSN, Pharm Azubike Okwo said the anti-counterfeiting measures such as the TruScan device, the SMS message system and other radio-frequency techniques, popularly branded by NAFDAC as cutting-edge technologies, were not fool-proof in detection and prevention of counterfeit drugs in the country.

Okwor, who urged NAFDAC to come up with newer and more effective initiatives to tackle the increasing wave of proliferation of counterfeit and fake drugs in the country, said the PSN had observed that the Agency is beginning to mount unprecedented propaganda which suggests its so-called anti-counterfeiting measures detect fake, counterfeit and substandard drugs on the spot

“We have a duty to tell Federal government and consumers that there are limitations to the potentials of NAFDAC’s anti-counterfeiting technologies. This becomes more important against the backdrop of a recent directive by the President that all anti-malaria’s must carry NAFDAC’s hi-tech facility on product packs.”

Okwor noted that such move would increase cost to consumers who would bear the financial burden of the presidential initiative.

“The truth is TruScan device, SMS tech and other radio-frequency technologies cannot detect fake, counterfeit or substandard drugs as it is not a test of the chemical equivalence of the active ingredient of the product which is verifiable only through assays in laboratories,” he declared

He explained that fake or substandard drugs designed to have appropriate labels from the central pool which have the compliant electronic chip the celebrated hi-tech measure, would always test positive, defeating the goal of safety and subjecting clients to a risky path.

Calling on the Federal Ministry of Health to collaborate with NAFDAC to champion the setting up of special drug courts to overcome the slow and frustrating judicial system that encourages violators of the Fake Drug Act to escape justice, Okwor argued:“The PSN, as a responsible body, encourages government to dismantle the open drug markets within the limits of the June 2012 deadline and urgently facilitate the take-off of the mega drug distribution centres as proposed in the recently approved National Drug Distribution Policy.”