Moves apace to upgrade regulations for pharmaceutical sector

Mar 18, 2018 News

The Public Health Ministry during the past week teamed up with the Pan American Health Organisation/World Health Organisation [PAHO/WHO] to spearhead a national conversation to help upgrade the laws, acts, regulations and policies guiding the local pharmaceutical sector. This move is one eyeing widespread abuse of anti-biotic medicines, the existence of illegal pharmacists and other irregularities instigated by many patients.
Mr. Oneil Atkins, Director of Pharmacies at the Ministry, said Friday that a two-day consultation last week is aimed at helping to beef up the existing “weak” medicines and pharmaceutical policies which are preyed upon by patients, professionals and charlatans operating in the sector.
Atkins said too that the forum is intended to help patients especially, to identify which are registered pharmacies in the country.
The two-day forum is also intended to help sharpen the awareness of local patients whom he said are “too uninformed” about critical pharmaceutical issues and policy matters in the sector.
Atkins, who also functions as Advisor to Public Health Minister, Ms. Volda Lawrence, is concerned that local patients always “demand medication every time they see a physician” when sometimes all they need is a conversation with a specialist.

Director of Pharmacies, Mr. Oneil Atkins

“We need to educate the public. The business of medicines is handled “very loosely” in Guyana by the professionals and the public,” Atkins said. He predicted that an outcome of the two-day consultation will “hold professionals accountable and responsible” for activities in the sector.
It is anticipated that although the archaic policies, laws, acts and regulations will be updated and be substantially more rigid, they will retain the element of “flexibility to ensure safety to ensure they provide maximum benefit from the medication for patients,” Atkins assured.
The Ministerial Advisor is especially concerned about the abuse of antibiotic medicines among practitioners and patients, and said the upgraded documents will force the former to be “more responsible and accountable and help keep counterfeit drugs off the local market.”
The “widespread abuse” is especially acute in Pomeroon/Supenaam [Region Two2]; Essequibo Islands/West Demerara [Region Three]; Demerara/Mahaica [Region Four] and East Berbice/Corentyne [Region Six], according to Atkins.
Consequently, he is hopeful that legislators will act “as fast as possible” to get the new laws and regulations enacted to help the Public Health Ministry deal with the “grave problem with antibiotic resistance in Guyana”.
Improvements are also urgent to help the government weed out many who are dispensing medicines, but “never saw a pharmacy school”.
The long-overdue overhauling of the pharmaceutical sector is to help “administer the quality of Primary Health Care and health services to the citizens of our beloved country,” Minister Lawrence pointed out when the issue became public last year.
She prescribed then that when improved “…policy decisions must be evidence-based and tailored to meet the specific needs of our population and health services”.
The Guyana Government remains strongly committed to ensuring healthy lives and the well-being for all and promises to continue to look and assess the existing Management systems. Also it is aimed at strengthening and making necessary changes to guarantee that the systems “can become efficient and effective and accessibility and adequacy of the supply of safe, essential, quality and scientifically sound drugs and medical products can be realised in all health facilities in all regions,” Lawrence has assured.
Dr. William Adu-Krow, PAHO/WHO Country Representative; Dr. Shamdeo Persaud, Guyana’s Chief Medical Officer; Atkins and Ms. Kesaundra Alves- Chairperson of the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC) Board, were among the officials who addressed the two-day forum.

Discover more from Kaieteur News

Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.

Latest News