Concerns about the proliferation of forged certificates of pharmaceutical products (CPPs) that are used to bring medications into Nigeria have been voiced by the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC).
This was disclosed by Prof. Mojisola Adeyeye, the Director-General of NAFDAC, during the Abuja stakeholders’ engagement meeting with legislators, regulators, and law enforcement agencies.
According to her, over 50% of CPPs entering the nation are fraudulent, and NAFDAC has prevented the entry of over 140 certified items via its pre-shipment testing programme.
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The World Health Organisation (WHO) evaluates the quality and safety of pharmaceutical products and the applicant in the exporting country through the issuance of a CPP. It is only applicable to a single product because manufacturing and approval data may differ for dosage forms and strengths.
Prof. Adeyeye stated that NAFDAC’s mission is to guarantee that medical items in circulation are safe, effective, and of the appropriate quality. He further stated that counterfeit and subpar products represent a major risk to public health and universal health care in Nigeria and throughout Africa.
She stated that NAFDAC has an obligation to deal with individuals who travel to China or India in order to obtain phoney CPPs and that NAFDAC is a part of the international and regional regulatory agencies that have committed to ensuring that goods entering the region are of a high calibre.
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“It’s a Member States issue, and we are going to deal with it,” she said.
She also mentioned that NAFDAC is extremely strict and will not accept any quality compromises, and that many companies that have broken its criteria have been placed on a blacklist and faced penalties from the organisation.
“Trade is a mutual agreement and if that agreement is harming one part of the agreement, we will stop it. If a company is suspected to be compromising, in two hours we will be there, and we will shut the company down,” she warned.
She bemoaned the fact that only around 10% of national regulatory bodies had reached maturity level three, which involves market control, and that this contributed to the comparatively high prevalence of inferior and counterfeit pharmaceuticals in Africa.
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She went on to say that NAFDAC’s mission is to see a decrease in counterfeit and subpar medications, both imported and produced domestically, and that the agency is making every effort to combat them through the use of three main strategies: prevent, detect, and respond.
But in order to find and fix the flaws in the system and safeguard public health, she urged cooperation and teamwork with other stakeholders.
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