Shiloh
Editor, Senior Moderator
Source: http://www.nationmedia.com/eastafrican/current/News/news190520081.htm
EA awash in bogus malaria medicine, says study
By KEVIN KELLEY
Special Correspondent
Roughly one-third of the malaria drugs sold at chemists in East Africa?s capital cities are ineffective, a new study has found. Tests on a total of 195 packs of malaria medicines bought in Dar es Salaam, Kampala, Kigali, Nairobi and two West African cities showed that 35 per cent either lacked sufficient amounts of active ingredients or did not dissolve quickly enough to work.
The incidence of ineffective drugs was highest in Kenya, with 38 per cent of the 42 packets purchased in Nairobi found to be sub-standard.
Tanzania?s rate was lowest, at 32 per cent, followed by Rwanda, a 33 per cent and Uganda, at 35 per cent.The malaria drugs most likely to fail quality tests were those manufactured in Africa, researchers said.
Nearly half of those medicines were found to be deficient, compared with 24 per cent of drugs of European origin.
The comparative weakness of regulatory systems in Africa may account for the difference, researchers suggest.They also report that 33 per cent of the tested packets contained only artemisinin, an anti-malarial agent produced in China and regarded as an especially promising treatment.
In order to prevent the malaria virus from developing resistance to this new drug, the World Health Organisation last year asked pharmaceutical companies to sell artemisinin only when it has been combined with other anti-malaria drugs.
?The high persistence of sub-standard drugs and clinically inappropriate artemisinin mono-therapies in the private sector risks patient safety and, through drug resistance, places the future of malaria treatment at risk globally,? the researchers write.
Their findings are published in The Public Library of Science.Thousands of East Africans could die as a result of the bogus drugs.
The authors of the new study do not attempt to quantify the impact of what they say is a public health crisis ?but,? they add, ?it must be staggering.?Malaria annually takes the lives of at least 500,000 Africans.
And Africans account for about 90 per cent of the half-billion people in the world who contract the disease, according to WHO.
The study?s authors ? Roger Bate of the Africa Fighting Malaria group in Washington; Richard Tren, a researcher with a US-based think tank; and Amir Attaran of the University of Ottawa in Canada ? urge other international agencies to join WHO in applying pressure on behalf of governments for more responsible production of anti-malaria drugs.
Specifically, they ask major multilateral donors such as the World Bank to make their anti-malaria aid conditional on the removal of artemisinin-only therapies from national formularies.
The researchers also call on the World Trade Organisation to enact rules prohibiting trade in artemisinin-only therapies and reducing tariffs on proper malaria medicines to zero.
EA awash in bogus malaria medicine, says study
By KEVIN KELLEY
Special Correspondent
Roughly one-third of the malaria drugs sold at chemists in East Africa?s capital cities are ineffective, a new study has found. Tests on a total of 195 packs of malaria medicines bought in Dar es Salaam, Kampala, Kigali, Nairobi and two West African cities showed that 35 per cent either lacked sufficient amounts of active ingredients or did not dissolve quickly enough to work.
The incidence of ineffective drugs was highest in Kenya, with 38 per cent of the 42 packets purchased in Nairobi found to be sub-standard.
Tanzania?s rate was lowest, at 32 per cent, followed by Rwanda, a 33 per cent and Uganda, at 35 per cent.The malaria drugs most likely to fail quality tests were those manufactured in Africa, researchers said.
Nearly half of those medicines were found to be deficient, compared with 24 per cent of drugs of European origin.
The comparative weakness of regulatory systems in Africa may account for the difference, researchers suggest.They also report that 33 per cent of the tested packets contained only artemisinin, an anti-malarial agent produced in China and regarded as an especially promising treatment.
In order to prevent the malaria virus from developing resistance to this new drug, the World Health Organisation last year asked pharmaceutical companies to sell artemisinin only when it has been combined with other anti-malaria drugs.
?The high persistence of sub-standard drugs and clinically inappropriate artemisinin mono-therapies in the private sector risks patient safety and, through drug resistance, places the future of malaria treatment at risk globally,? the researchers write.
Their findings are published in The Public Library of Science.Thousands of East Africans could die as a result of the bogus drugs.
The authors of the new study do not attempt to quantify the impact of what they say is a public health crisis ?but,? they add, ?it must be staggering.?Malaria annually takes the lives of at least 500,000 Africans.
And Africans account for about 90 per cent of the half-billion people in the world who contract the disease, according to WHO.
The study?s authors ? Roger Bate of the Africa Fighting Malaria group in Washington; Richard Tren, a researcher with a US-based think tank; and Amir Attaran of the University of Ottawa in Canada ? urge other international agencies to join WHO in applying pressure on behalf of governments for more responsible production of anti-malaria drugs.
Specifically, they ask major multilateral donors such as the World Bank to make their anti-malaria aid conditional on the removal of artemisinin-only therapies from national formularies.
The researchers also call on the World Trade Organisation to enact rules prohibiting trade in artemisinin-only therapies and reducing tariffs on proper malaria medicines to zero.