The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) has warned patent medicine dealers in Imo State against selling counterfeit, expired and dangerous drugs to members of the public.
The agency’s Director-General, Prof. Mojisola Adeyeye, gave the warning on Friday in Owerri during a sensitisation workshop on pharmacovigilance and drug distribution safety organised for members of the Nigerian Association of Patent and Proprietary Medicine Dealers (NAPPMED).
Adeyeye, represented by NAFDAC’s South-East Zonal Director, Dr Festus Ukadike, cautioned medicine dealers against prioritising profits over human lives through unsafe drug distribution practices.
“Any unregistered product is fake. If you sell unregistered products, it means you are selling fake products,” she said, stressing that commercial interests must not come at the expense of public health.
She condemned practices such as illegally changing the expiry dates of medicines, altering product labels and purchasing drugs from questionable itinerant suppliers offering unusually large discounts.
The NAFDAC boss also reiterated the ban on dangerous, unregistered and controlled substances, including high-dose tramadol variants, anarcha and discontinued suspensions allegedly being circulated illegally in communities.
“Expired medicines have no second life; once they have expired, they must never be given a second chance to endanger human lives,” she warned.
Adeyeye said the agency had deployed intelligence-driven surveillance and handheld digital scanners to monitor supply chains, raid illegal warehouses and shut down premises of vendors who violate regulations. She added that offenders involved in falsifying expiry dates or selling fake drugs risk business closure, product forfeiture, administrative sanctions and criminal prosecution.
Speaking on Good Storage and Distribution Practices, NAFDAC Assistant Chief Regulatory Officer, Dr Cletus Agwu, urged wholesalers and distributors to obtain medical products only from authorised manufacturers and supply them to legally permitted outlets.
He stressed the need for proper temperature control, quality management systems and accurate documentation, declaring that “whatever is not documented is not done.”
In a separate lecture on pharmacovigilance, NAFDAC State Coordinator, Mrs Helen Okanya, urged patent medicine dealers to report suspected adverse drug reactions, product quality concerns and substandard medicines through the agency’s digital MedSafety App.
She explained that reporting was intended to identify and address public health concerns, not to punish medicine dealers. Okanya also disclosed that similar sensitisation programmes had been organised for dealers in the Okigwe and Orlu senatorial districts.
The Imo State Chairman of NAPPMED, Mr Cyprian Okonkwo, commended NAFDAC for the initiative, saying it had improved members’ understanding of regulatory compliance, safe drug storage and consumer protection.
He pledged that the association would share the knowledge gained with medicine vendors across the state’s 27 local government areas and strengthen its partnership with NAFDAC to eliminate counterfeit, expired and substandard drugs from the distribution chain.