Tareen Rahman :
The markets in Bangladesh is currently flooded with adulterated and fake medicines . Some 200 out of around 250 licensed medicine companies are manufacturing sub-standard medicines, officials of the Directorate of Drug Administration (DDA ) allege, while lawyers say the country’s lone drug court remains idle and does not take legal action against the offenders.
According to sources, the reckless sale of adulterated medicines and their consumption by unaware patients are causing serious harm to public health. There are a number of fake pharmaceutical companies engaged in producing adulterated and fake medicines which are being distributed across the country through the wholesale drug market at Mitford in the capital.
“Though we are being fed poison at a high price in the name of medicine, no active legal steps are being taken,” said Anwar Zahid Bhuiyan, former Special Public Prosecutor of the Drug Court.
There are drug superintendents in just 27 of the country’s 64 districts. The Drug Administration cannot check smuggling of the banned and low quality medicines into the country from India, Pakistan, Thailand, Middle East and other countries.
‘ Most drug inspectors are reportedly receiving monthly allowances from blacklisted companies,’ Public Prosecutor Mahmud Hossain Jahangir said .
According to the existing law, the superintendents of the Drug Administration can only file cases. Police can file a case in exceptional circumstances. But permission has to be obtained from the Drug Administration for investigation.
Lawyers blame the drug administration for laxity in taking legal action. They also blame drug inspectors and superintendents for leniency and corruption. The Drug Administration, on the other hand, blames lack of resources.
Dr. Iftekharuzzaman, Executive Director ,Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB), spoke on the role of Directorate of Drug Administration, ‘ Positive and negative incentives. Codes of conduct for the employees have to be introduced to reduce irregularities and corruption in drug administration.’
‘ Representation of the pharmaceutical owners in different drug related committees (especially drug control committee, manufacturing license committee, drug pricing committee, and black list approval committee) should be avoided. Pharmaceutical companies producing sub-standard, fake and adulterated drugs should be identified and legal actions have to be made against them.’
TIB Trustee Board Chairperson Sultana Kamal has linked the Drug Administration’s weak governance to the overall governance situation in the country. ‘Medicine is something very much linked to our life. So, the authorities must look at it very seriously,’ she said.
The TIB suggested amending drug-related laws, increasing manpower and logistics of the DGDA, introducing one-stop and online services for companies and drug stores and taking tough action against law-breakers.
Seeking amendments of the drug control laws, the lawyer said legislation should be amended to give members of the public the chance to file cases directly if affected by adulterated medicines. ‘ Otherwise adulterated medicines will prevail in the market,’ said Dulal Mitra, a Drug Court lawyer.
The drug court was founded in 1992 under the Drug Control Ordinance of 1982. Low quality, adulterated and unregistered medicine, selling of medicines allocated for government hospitals and increasing the price of drugs disregarding rules are considered crimes under the law. Even though opinions and recommendations have been sent to the drug administration for filing a few thousand cases, there were no end results, said public prosecutors of the court.
The law also imposes a ban on advertisements of drugs without permission from the authorities. It also says that no unregistered medicine can be produced, imported or sold, Guidelines of the World Health Organisation in manufacturing medicines should be followed.
The law prescribes punishment for producing medicine of low quality, importing unregistered medicine and selling those at a high price and of selling government-funded medicine in retail market.
