The Food and Drugs Authority (FDA) in the Volta Region has destroyed confiscated counterfeit pharmaceutical products worth GH₵42 million.
The products included aphrodisiacs, post pills, body enhancement, antibiotics and processed food among others.
The majority of the contraband was intercepted at the Ghana-Togo border in Akanu, being smuggled into the country. Others were rounded up during routine surveys and swoops on the markets across the Volta and Oti regions.
The products were first shredded and disinfected at the Jopong Group of Company’s Medical Waste Treatment Facility in Akrofu before being disposed of at the dumping sites for burning.
The Volta Regional Director of the FDA, Gordon Akurugu, said they decided to engage the services of the facility to ensure the appropriate disposable of the confiscated counterfeit pharmaceutical products.
He reiterated that pharmaceutical products must only be imported through the airport or sea and not inland borders, and that anyone caught using land borders “to bring in such products would be arrested and have the items seized.”
“We also have to put on record that pharmaceutical products are not supposed to move through the inland borders and that is why such products coming into the country, especially from Nigeria are not allowed in. If you want to import drugs into the country, then it has to be KIA or Tema ports”, he said.
He advised the citizenry to desist from buying pharmaceutical products from unapproved sources to prevent them from consuming counterfeit products, and only buy from approved sources such as pharmacies, over-the-counter chemical selling points, and hospitals.
“We want to take this opportunity to caution consumers. You see that there is a counterfeited procold, Postino 2, and you can see a lot of Afrodesaics. These are products that they bring in to deceive us. You may take them today thinking it will work for you, but I tell you it will have other health implications”, he said.
Mr. Akurugu stressed that his outfit would always be on the high alert to fish out persons engaged in smuggling activities and warned drivers to desist from being used as conduits to perpetrate crime.
He concluded by appealing to other FDA Regional Offices to engage the services of a medical treatment plants in disposing of pharmaceutical products to protect the environment.
The Ho Municipal Environmental Health Officer, Rev Lawrence Senya said they decided to use the appropriate methods to dispose of the confiscated products to “safeguard public health.”
“There are sometimes at places where these drugs are not properly disposed you will find people picking and sending them back into the community”, he said.
He called for the collaboration of the public to weed out persons engaging in inappropriate sales of pharmaceutical products.
“We want to use the opportunity to educate the public that anytime you see somebody who is selling drugs, holding a bag in the streets or lorry parks, you can be certain that those drugs have not gone through the appropriate quarters. That is why they are selling them in that manner. We should not purchase such drugs”, he stressed.
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