| Business |
Kill or cure
IT appears that it takes the acting
chief executive officer at Lae’s venerable Angau Hospital to
draw attention to the flood of stolen and fake drugs that has
inundated many stores and markets in Papua New Guinea.
We commend Dr Polapoi Chalou for drawing attention to the risks
involved in buying and using these drugs and to the growing
trade in stolen drugs intended for the health network in PNG.
He is not the only doctor to make this issue public.
The Madang Chamber of Commerce recently heard from one of the
town’s private practitioners, Dr John Mackerell, who spoke of
his alarm over the same issue.
The facts are simple.
There can be few major markets in PNG that do not host sellers
of both fake and stolen medicines.
The fake medicines are imported – there is a vast number of
phony medications available around the world.
The National has had some particular concerns; the victims of
cancer and of HIV/AIDS and a handful of other incurable diseases
have been high on our list.
For some years, The National has drawn attention to home-brewed
“medicines” sold mainly at markets. These dubious fluids, often
decanted into used soft drink bottles, are sold to the credulous
and the desperate for large sums of money.
Make no mistake – these supposed medications are nothing but a
cruel scam targeting people who are terminally ill, people who
will accept the sweeping claims attributed to these various
concoctions.
The National has fought long and hard to get Health Department
officials to address this matter and take some pre-emptive
action.
We are unaware of any such initiatives to date.
Yet such scams are nothing but cruel confidence tricks and the
general public should help to rid our country of these shysters.
Dr Chalou’s concerns centre on both the drugs stolen from
medical stores in PNG and the appearance of cleverly presented
and apparently authentic medications bearing famous names.
At the very least the fake drugs will achieve nothing for those
who have paid good money to buy them. But there is a more
serious scenario.
Many of our own people may not realise the accuracy and
precision that goes into manufacturing even the most commonplace
analgesic.
As for any drugs associated with terminal diseases, such as
cancer and HIV/AIDS, even the slightest deviation in some of the
component chemicals in these complex medications could result in
death.
As it stands, drugs intended to relieve the atrocious pain of
cancer can produce side effects that can sometimes be almost as
unbearable as the illness itself.
Abacavir sulphate is a common component of the cocktail of
HIV/AIDS management drugs used in PNG.
The drug comes accompanied with a warning from the manufacturing
laboratory; in part it refers to a serious allergic reaction
that can be life-threatening.
If that hypersensitivity is confirmed by a doctor, the patient
is warned that “you must never take abacavir again as within
hours, you may experience a life-threatening lowering of your
blood pressure or death”.
We’ve highlighted that component drug in an effort to make our
readers aware of the dangers of taking drugs purchased without a
prescription.
Specific illnesses demand specific and finely-tuned medications.
What works for one patient may prove disastrous for another and
it is only a doctor or a properly qualified pharmacist who is
trained to establish the difference.
Our medical system works on the assumption that drugs are
prescribed by doctors and dispensed by pharmacists. Both of
these professions have rigid codes of ethics, in PNG as in most
other countries.
The National Government must block the gaps in the import system
that allow fake drugs to enter the country.
And at the same time the Government has the responsibility to
safeguard scarce shipments of legitimate drugs and make certain
that they do not fall into the hands of thieves and confidence
tricksters.
We cannot maintain a network of health clinics and aid posts and
small rural hospitals without drugs.
That should be obvious. Lack of funds to provide them may be
defensible, although we doubt that.
But carelessness and apathy leading to theft and scams on a
grand scale are simply a travesty of justice and good
government.
 
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