Africans Risk Getting Inferior Malaria Drugs

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By Shamsydeen Badmus

Published: February 9, 2010

Africans Risk Getting Inferior Malaria Drugs

Shamsydeen Badmus

Tests of anti-malaria drugs used in Africa have revealed that patients from both public and private health practices could be getting sub-standard treatment. Experts examined 200 samples of anti-malaria drugs from 10 African countries. They found 44 per cent of the drugs from Senegal failed the quality control tests. Thirty per cent of the drugs from Madagascar and 26 per cent from Uganda also failed. The results for the other seven countries have not been released yet. The failed samples were found to contain inadequate amounts of active ingredients or impurities. The World Health Organization’s (WHO) malaria programme chief Robert Newman said low-grade anti-malaria drugs could increase resistance by not killing all of the parasites. The study was conducted by the US government-funded Pharmacopeia programme for the WHO.

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