New Partnership to Fight Counterfeit Drugs in Africa
By Ben Omondi
With the new service, patients taking a range of medication manufactured by May & Baker Nigeria PLC and the KAMA Group of Ghana can send a free text message to get an instant response as to whether the tablets or syrup bottles they received are genuine.
Counterfeit medicines often contain the wrong quantity of active pharmaceutical ingredients, which can result in illness or death. The system from HP and mPedigree assigns a code that is revealed by scratching off a coating on the drugs’ packaging which is then sent via text message by the consumer or medical professional to a free SMS (short message service) number to verify the authenticity of the drug.
If the drug packaging contains a counterfeit code, the consumer will receive a message alerting them that the pack may be a fake, as well as a phone number to report the incident.
Already, pharmaceutical safety regulators in Ghana and Nigeria are working to ensure that the concerns of users are promptly addressed.
“Counterfeit pharmaceuticals are a big problem for developing nations, particularly in Africa. It is important that we develop an African solution to an African problem, using the resources and technologies that are widely available and easy to implement,” said Bright Simons, founder, mPedigree Network. “It’s absolutely imperative that people can trust the authenticity of the drugs they are consuming, and this system will give them an easy and effective way of doing so.”
The service is funded by the participating pharmaceutical companies. Nigeria-based May & Baker Nigeria has already begun supplying its extensive distribution network of chemists and clinics across Nigeria with medicines that are packaged with codes. The current deployment covers three of the company’s lines of anti-malarial (artelum), anti-amoebicide (loxagyl) and analgesic (easadol) medication.
“Over the years, we have invested a huge amount of time and money in developing drugs which will protect the health of people around the world. It’s in both our and our customers’ interest that they receive the full benefit of that investment. This system will safeguard both of us now and in the future.” said Dr. Joseph Ikemefuna Odumodu, chief executive, May & Baker Nigeria, and president, West African Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association.
HP is providing the hosting infrastructure for the service, as well as the security and integrity systems, through its data centers in Frankfurt, Germany while mPedigree Network is providing the business process interfaces that allow pharmaceutical companies to code their products for the system and to monitor use of genuine and counterfeit drugs.
The service, which was recently endorsed by the West African Health Organization, is expected to be available for other medications and in more countries in the near future. As of now, all GSM mobile network operators in Ghana and Nigeria are signatories to the scheme.
“Technology plays a critical role in solving many serious health problems around the world,” said Gabriele Zedlmayer, vice president, Office of Global Social Innovation, HP. “While Nigeria and Ghana are the starting points for this program, we are working to create a scalable infrastructure to be leveraged by other regions where counterfeit medicine is a growing issue.”
The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that counterfeit drugs constitute approximately 10 per cent of the global drug market and 25 per cent of the drug market in developing countries. Revenues from counterfeit drugs were estimated to be around US $75 billion globally by last year.
The use of counterfeit drugs, on the other hand, is estimated to cause at least 700,000 deaths per year.
Counterfeit drugs also have a severe impact on the pharmaceutical industry, with manufacturers suffering economic losses from patent and copyright infringement. In Nigeria alone, hundreds of thousands of medicine buyers can benefit from the technology as up to 6 million packs could be integrated into the service over the coming year.