Guyana to introduce stricter laws to combat sale of unprescribed antibiotics, fake drugs

Jun 25, 2024 News

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Kaieteur News – Guyana is set to have stricter laws in place to deal with the sale of unprescribed antibiotics and fake drugs, Health Minister Dr. Frank Anthony revealed on Sunday.

Dr. Anthony was at the time addressing a gathering of pharmacist and other healthcare providers at the commencement of the Commonwealth Pharmacists’ Week of events, annual convention, hosted at the Pegasus Suites and Corporate Centre, in Kingston.

According to the minister, the move is part of efforts in the local health administration to combat the global resistance to antimicrobial (antibiotic) medication. “We have a problem and it’s not only in Guyana its global where people abuse this medication. Here in Guyana people present themselves to some of the pharmacies and ask for antibiotics and that they are being sold being without a prescription and that is against the current laws that we have,” the minister said as he urged pharmacists and other health workers acting in violation of the law to rethink their actions.

“If you don’t change this type of behavior then we will have to close you down,” Dr. Anthony warned.  Giving a scenario of how the medication is being misused, Dr. Anthony said there are cases when somebody has flu and the pharmacist or health care provider gives them antibiotic to treat the case. “What you are really doing is contributing  to the resistance we have with antibiotic … we have cases in this country where we have patients who develop resistance to many of the medication we have…If we continue this indiscriminate use of  antibiotics we are only going to accelerate.”

Dr. Anthony noted that pharmacist have to take responsibility for some of the issues but also doctors who are not prescribing medications properly. “If the prescription is not necessary then we must not do it.”

Alluding to global figures surrounding the issue, Dr Anthony noted that at present, the WHO estimates that globally about seven million people who died from antimicrobial resistance.  “That’s a big number and that’s going to climb.  So, there is a big move now globally for us to try to do something about the antimicrobial resistance.  We will have a high level meeting at the UN in September. And at that meeting we are working a political declaration at it relates to antimicrobial resistance and there are many facets to this and after that meeting, one of the hopes is that we can establish an intergovernmental panel to deal with antimicrobial resistance…” he added.

Another area of drug administration that the Minister described as “very problematic,” is the fight against counterfeit medications. “It’s a global problem medication… when counterfeit drugs are in the system it can create a big problem. This new medicine regulations law would target fake medicines,” he said.

“We also want to take a firmer stand on falsification of medications because we do have, and it’s a global problem, where medicines are being counterfeited and so one of the challenges if you have counterfeit medication in the system, it can create problems in management of patients,” said Dr. Anthony.

He explained that while the Ministry would have a system in place, citizens have a responsibility to report such matters to them.  “Also the importers of these medications would have to do their own monitoring, as is done in other jurisdictions,” he said.

Each year on June 16th, Commonwealth Pharmacists Day is observed to recognise and appreciate the significant contributions made by pharmacists across the Commonwealth. The Guyana Pharmacists’ Association (GPA)—the local arm –engaged in a planned a week of activities in observance of Commonwealth Pharmacists Week, which commenced on June 16th and concludes on June 23rd.

This year’s theme for Commonwealth Pharmacists’ Day is “Pharmacists developing resilient and sustainable health systems for all”. The theme was chosen with the aim of emphasizing the importance of collaboration between patients and pharmacists in managing the health and wellbeing of the Guyanese population.

The GPA’s theme for this week of observances is “Empowering pharmacists through collaboration to elevate pharmaceutical care and promote healthy lifestyles”. In keeping with this theme, a number of patient education sessions have been planned in various regions across the country, including Suddie, Georgetown, Turkeyen, Bartica, Mahdia, Lethem and Linden. During these sessions, chronic disease patients will be educated on issues of “safe medication use” – including tips on how to take and store their medication and how to properly use a pill box. Additionally, over 700 pill boxes will be distributed free of cost.

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• antibiotics, fake drugs, Guyana, stricter, unprescribed

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