Indians who manufacture and export substandard food and drug products to Nigeria will be liable to life imprisonment.

National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Con­trol (NAFDAC) which disclosed this said Nigerian collaborators of such dealers will face the same jail term if found guilty.

Nafdac said in a statement made available to Daily Trust yesterday, “Any fake and counter­feit drug offender apprehended for dealing in fake pharmaceuti­cal products faces a life sentence in India if current moves by the country's drug regulatory agency succeeds at the parliament."

The statement which was signed by the Deputy Director General, Dr Paul Orhii, the India Drug Regulatory Authority is currently pushing through the parliament a draft legislation that would impose a life jail term on anybody who manufactures and exports fake rugs to Nigeria. Similarly, any Nigerian drug importer who connives with any Indian drug company to produce fake drugs to Nigeria will also be jailed for life upon conviction by the court.”

Nafdac which answers the call by government and people to ‘Safeguard the health of the nation' has often had problems with fake drug and food sub­stances believed to come into the country mainly from India.

Abubakar Jimoh's statement quoted the NAFDAC DG to have said regarding the new antifake drug initiative, “The Indian Government is as worried as the Nigerian Government about the problem of fake drugs. The Indian pharmaceutical industry is highly advanced and produces good quality drugs but only a few bad eggs are trying to paint the country black. The Indian High Commissioner to Nigeria has visited and discussed severally on this problem and shows readiness to team up with us to check incidence.”

According to the statement, Dr Orhii's delegation to India was received by an Indian Government delegation led by the Indian Joint Secretary of the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers, Dr Devendra Chaudhry, who, according to the statement, assured the NAFDAC delegation that the proposed life jail term would be pursued and that it would serve as a deterrent to fake drug dealers who were hitherto having a free reign.

Meanwhile, the four-day training on chemical risk management for the regulatory staff of NAFDAC and related government agencies has commenced in Abuja.

The training which will also involve regulatory and quality control personnel of food and pharmaceutical companies across the country started at the Rock View Hotel, Abuja yester day with optimism by NAFDAC and Standard Organisation of Nigeria (SON) that the training will enhance the knowledge and skills of participating staff to carry out their functions more appropriately and make the environ­ment safer for all.

Director General of SON, Dr John Akanya who spoke dur­ing the opening ceremony of the training programme expressed need for Nigerians, particularly quality control and regulatory officials of supervisory agencies of government and manufacturing concerns, to be equipped with the right knowledge and skills on the risks of chemical waste being daily released into the environ­ment by manufacturing companies.

Dr Orhii had said on Thursday while addressing a press conference on the four-day course that NAFDAC decided to train its regulatory staff as well as personnel of related agencies and industries to broaden their knowledge on emerging trends in chemical risk management and enhance their capacity to do their jobs well.

He had announced that rele­vant personal of pharmaceutical, food and cosmetics industries and lexicologists in the academia are to be involved also in the four-day Conference on Chemical Risk Assessment Training Course which NAFDAC was organising in collaboration with US-based International Union of Toxicol­ogy (IUTOX), a professional organisation formed to improve human health through the sci­ence and practice of toxicology worldwide.

Dr. Orhii had explained the thrust of the programme, “At the end of the training, partici­pants from NAFDAC and other government regulatory agencies will be equipped with adequate knowledge and current skills to further protect public health and be informed on the kind of data to present to the regulatory agen­cies.”

The facilitator of the train­ing programme, Dr Anoka Njam who spoke as the programme kicked off yesterday confirmed that the specialist brought the United State could be relied on to give such training as could be expected from professional all around the world.

Nafdac’s DG, Dr Orhii had explained earlier that the decision to bring the resource persons into the country was to mitigate the higher cost of having to sponsor those to benefit from the training to the U.S.

Industrial wastes can pose a potential hazard to the human health or the environment (soil, air, waste) when improperly treated, stored, transported or disposed off.

By: Ruby Rabiu
Daily trust Tue.18th, August 2009. Pg.47