The Food and Drugs Authority (FDA) has outlined plans to establish more border posts to stop counterfeit drugs from being brought into the country through the borders.
Speaking at a conference aimed at sensitising distributors of medicines in Accra, the Head of the Drugs Information Department of the FDA, Mr Thomas Amedzro, said 90 per cent of counterfeit drugs found on the Ghanaian market entered the country through its borders.
The conference was organised by Ayrton Drug Manufacturing Limited, a pharmaceutical company, and brought together distributors of medicines and stakeholders in the pharmaceutical sector to deliberate on how best to fight counterfeit medicine in the country.
�We are also expanding all our laboratory centres in the 10 regions of Ghana to enable us to check every product brought into the country,� Mr Amedzro said.
He said most of the fake drugs that had been seized by FDA were smuggled across the country�s borders and cautioned members of the public against purchasing medicines from unapproved centres, since the practice could pose a danger to their health.
�Although we have challenges with the authorised centres, they are still our best bet, since the health officials are trained to detect fake drugs,� he said.
Giving statistics on the counterfeit products seized in the first quarter of the year, he said apart from the FDA detaining 1,000 substandard and poor quality condoms, it had also destroyed 13,000 fake Oxytocin drugs.
Oxytocin and Ergometerine injections are used to control bleeding in women after child delivery.
Mr Amedzro reiterated that measures were being put in place by the FDA to ensure that no counterfeit medicines came into the country.
The Managing Director of Ayrton Drug Manufacturing Limited, Mr Daniel Apeagyei Kissi, said the company was committed to manufacturing high quality medicines at affordable prices with a view to extending and enhancing human life.
He said Aryton�s vision was to be the leading pharmaceutical and healthcare company in West Africa.
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