A report by a US-based drug quality standards body has revealed that 26 per cent of anti-malaria drugs in Uganda are substandard. The report was released Tuesday.
Researchers from the Pharmacopeia Group in the US also found that in Madagascar, at least 30 per cent of the drugs and 44 per cent in Senegal failed the test on good quality. This meant that patients were being treated using low-grade drugs, creating the possibility of drug resistance.
At least 200 samples of the anti-malaria drugs from the three countries were subjected to quality control testing in a US laboratory.
Leading killer
Malaria is a leading killer in Uganda, with at least 300 deaths registered daily especially among children under five years and pregnant women. The research included anti-malaria drugs from both public and private health facilities. The particular problem they identified was with artemisinin-based drugs. The chemical is one of the few affordable and effective treatments for malaria.
Uganda recently switched from monotherapy drugs like chloroquine and fansidar to artemisinin-based combination therapies (ACTs) like Coertem after the former developed resistance. Officials at the drug regulatory body, the National Drug Authority, said while they had not seen the report, various reasons could explain the poor quality of some drugs.
Reasons given
NDA spokesperson Fred Ssekyana said yesterday: "If drugs are not stored properly, even if manufactured today, can go bad." He, however, said the NDA has the capacity to test samples of drugs that come into the country for quality. "The challenge now is to ensure that from within the country, we are not going to get people making fake drugs," he explained.
Source: Allafrica
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