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The Pharmacists Council of Nigeria (PCN) on Friday sealed 148 medicine shops in Cross River for unauthorised sale of drugs. Mr Stephen Esumobi, Deputy Director and Head of Enforcement, PCN, Abuja, made this known during a press conference in Calabar. He said the action was taken as part of measures to ensure that only quality drugs are sold to members of the public. According to him, the patent medicine shops were also closed for operating without the supervision of a pharmacist, poor storage conditions of drugs and low education of medicine vendors, among others.
Esumobi said that the enforcement was carried out after series of reports of the activities of unregistered premises, which engage in the illegal sale of medicines in the state. He added that some of the registered premises were selling beyond the approved list laid down by PCN. According to him, PCN is charged with the responsibility of regulating and controlling the education, training and practice of pharmacy in all ramifications as established by the PCN Act 2004.
The Medical Laboratory Science Council of Nigeria (MLSCN) on Friday renewed its commitment to eradicating illegal laboratories and improving service delivery. Prof. Anthony Emeribe, Registrar of the council, said this in an interview with the News agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja. He said the council has established a National Corrective Action team to follow up on laboratories to ensure accurate lab result and quality service delivery. Emeribe explained that the measure was part of the council’s efforts to rid the system of illegal practices, among others.
He further said that the team was charged with the responsibility to follow up on laboratories that are not turning out accurate results. The registrar, who decried inaccurate laboratory results turn out from some laboratories, added that the measure would steer such lab to rise up to their responsibilities of quality result. He explained that quality healthcare services commenced from lab result, saying that when a laboratory produce inaccurate results it would deny the patients of efficient and quality healthcare services.
NMA Promises Free Services On Sanitation Days, Tambuwal Pledges Cash Rewards
The Sokoto State Chapter of the Nigerian Medical Association(NMA) has promised to provide free medical services to people taking part in the environmental sanitation in the state. The Chairman, NMA in the state, Dr Abdulgafar Jimoh, stated this in a statement issued in Sokoto on Sunday. According to him, the gesture is aimed at complementing the efforts of the state government to rid the state of filth. ” The programme will in no small measure improve on the health of the citizenry as most of the communicable diseases are associated with poor sanitation and poor personal hygiene. “We wish to encourage the Tambuwal’s administration to maintain and sustain this public health initiative.
”It will certainly reduce communicable and water-borne diseases like diarrhoea and malaria which are among the major public health problems in our society. “We wish to assure the state government of continuous support in developing the health sector. “A clean environment is a necessary requirement to a healthy life,” he was quoted in the statement.Meanwhile, Gov. Aminu Tambuwal of Sokoto State has commended the people for turning out in large number to participate in the Saturday environmental sanitation across the state.
The Nigerian Association of Hospital and Administrative Pharmacists has called on President Muhammadu Buhari to address the injustice in the health sector.The association made the call in a communique forwarded to our correspondent by its Vice-Chairman, Mr. Kingsley Amibor, on Tuesday. Members of the association in Lokoja, Kogi State, at a conference entitled, “Transforming Hospital and Administrative Pharmacy Practice for Improved Healthcare Delivery.” According to the association, the Federal Ministry of Health and other health institutions in the country have been denying its members key positions.
It stated, “We have appraised the incessant spate of industrial unrests within the Nigerian health sector and traced its origin to the hegemony of injustice perpetrated by one group of health professionals perennially. “These professionals use the instruments of offices of their privileged members in high places to seek favours. “We, therefore, call on the Federal Government under the leadership President Muhammadu Buhari, to demonstrate that it has the political will to redress the glaring cases of injustice and impunity that have become the hallmark of the health sector.”
President Muhammadu Buhari has honoured the memory of Nigeria’s late Ebola doctor, Stella Adadevoh.
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Dr Adadevoh died on August 19, 2015, after contracting the disease in a bid to keep index patient, Patrick Sawyerconfined to the First Consultant Hospital in Lagos. 
ORTHODONTISTS under the aegis of Nigerian Association of Orthodontists (NAO) have decried a situation where there are only 39 registered members and 4,600 dentists for a population of 170 million people. Top members of the Association in a chat with journalists in Lagos recently said the situation in Nigeria where there is one orthodontist to four million people is in contrast to the United States where there are about 9,000 orthodontists serving a population of 310 million people, which is about one orthodontist to 35,000 people.
Faced with a plethora of petitions from members of the public alleging poor implementation of the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS), the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has called on the Federal Government to review the Scheme to address some noticeable challenges. The Rights Commission has disclosed its intention to invite the leadership of the scheme to explain why beneficiaries were experiencing difficulties in accessing medical services. Executive Secretary of the Commission, Bem Angwe, made the call yesterday in a chat with journalists at the Commission headquarters.
Health workers in Nigeria waste thousands of expensive malaria drugs prescribing them to patients who do not have malaria, a new research by experts at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, has revealed. About 5,000 health workers working in public health facilities, pharmacies and drug stores from 40 communities in Enugu State were involved in the research. According to the study, patients are often given malaria drugs based on their signs and symptoms, contrary to standard recommendations by the World Health Organisation that patients’ blood should be tested for the presence of malaria parasites before confirmed cases are treated with Artemisin-based Combination Therapy.
Statistics from the World Health Organisation (WHO) have revealed that an estimated 1.5 million children around the world still die each year of diseases that could be prevented by vaccines that already exist just as 1 in 5 children still do not receive routine life-saving immunizations. According to a statement from the organization, people who delay or refuse vaccines for themselves or their children are presenting a growing challenge for countries seeking to close the immunization gap. In a special issue of the journal Vaccine, guest-edited by WHO and published last week, experts review the role of vaccine hesitancy in limiting vaccine coverage and explore strategies to address it. Vaccine hesitancy refers to delay in acceptance or refusal of safe vaccines despite availability of vaccination services.To privatise or not to privatise, that is the question now in Nigeria’s health sector
The furor over the proposed policy of Private Public Partnership (PPP) in the health sector cannot be wished away because of its likely implications for access to healthcare by majority of poor Nigerians. The Yayale Committee Report on disharmony in the health sector gave a hint of government’s preparedness to adopt the policy. The report calls for the privatisation of federal hospitals in the country through the system of PPP. In retrospection, we recollect that the debate over the suitability of the idea started since 2006 when the National Council on Health (NCH) purportedly looked into the idea and approved it initially under former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s administration and last year under the President Jonathan’s administration.More...
Countdown to declare Sierra Leone Ebola free begins as last patient is discharged
A 42 day countdown to declare Sierra Leone Ebola free started on Tuesday, 25th August 2015 following the discharge of the last patient, Adama Sankoh from hospital. The 42 days is double the incubation period of 21 days. The incubation period is the time between contraction and manifestation of symptoms in an infected person. The discharged patient contracted the virus after her son died from the disease late last month. She was presented with a certificate by President Ernest Bai Koroma following her discharge.
“The Ebola fight is not yet over – go and tell members of your community that” the president said. “Go back to your community and continue to live life as you used to.” The Independent reported that Sankoh, whose 23-year-old son contracted Ebola in the capital, Freetown, before traveling to his home village, thanked everyone who provided her care during her illness. She also vowed to be the last person infected in Sierra Leone with the virus. “Although my child died of Ebola I am very happy that I have survived today,” she said upon leaving the Ebola treatment centre in Mateneh village on the outskirts of Makeni, the president’s hometown.
The federal medical center just recently returned to work after medical services were suspended for over three months. The cause was the faceoff between members of the house unions and the chief medical director. A similar situation appears to be unfolding at the Federal Medical Center, Owo, Ondo state as members of the Association of Resident Doctors (ARD) are demanding that the Federal Ministry of Health recalls Dr. Adediran Kolajo, the administrator of the hospital who is acting on interim basis. They are making the demand on the grounds of his victimization of her members.
The association also wants the Ministry to investigate projects executed before and during the tenure of Dr. Kolajo. Dr. Isaiah Oke, the president of the association disclosed these at a press conference held inside the hospital. The association is also alleging that the hospital’s new management led by the CMD has declared to make life unbearable for her members and the hallmark of this undesirable attitude was the destruction of their lounge located inside the hospital complex.
The United State Agency for International Development (USAID) on Thursday began the construction of its warehouse for proper storage of essential medicines and health products in Nigeria. Speaking at the Ground Breaking Ceremony in Lagos, its Director, Mr Mike Harvey, said the project was a state-of-the-art warehouse. The “Warehouse-In-a Box’’ is sited at the Federal Medical Store Oshodi, Lagos. “This warehouse will serve as a storage facility, one of those planned to be built in Lagos with the support of the U.S. and the Federal Ministry of Health in Nigeria.
“This facility will support the country’s pharmaceutical supply chain, and once this is up and running, the warehouse will make sure that women, children and families in Nigeria get quality drugs. “It will also help to provide quality drugs in every part of the country,’’ Harvey said. He added that the warehouse would be funded by USAID and the Global Fund for AIDS, TB and Malaria. “The total fund for the construction would be five million dollars, with USAID providing four million, while Global Fund and the private sector will source the rest,’’ he said.
New research has revealed that Ebola can survive in detectable concentrations in wastewater for eight days – a finding that has implications for the disposal of contaminated liquid waste during epidemics and outbreaks. The study, by researchers at the University of Pittsburgh and Drexel University, both in Philadelphia, and the National Institute of Health (NIH), is published in the Environmental Science & Technology Letters. According to the latest World Health Organisation (WHO) situation report, there have been 28,005 confirmed cases and 11,287 deaths as a result of the virus since cases were first reported in March 2014.
In their background information, the authors note that in the wake of the outbreak, there remained significant questions on the appropriate handling of virus-contaminated liquid waste and one of these concerns is the persistence of Ebola in wastewater. Studies have indicated that the virus can persist in survivors. For example, one study describes how viable Ebola virus was found in the eye of a survivor months after recovery. In contrast, there is limited data on the fate and transport of Ebola in wastewater collection systems.
