Kazeem Ugbodaga
FILE PHOTO: Lagos State Ministry of Health officials shut down an illegal medical center
The Lagos State Government has shut down 29 illegal pharmacies and chemists across the State for operating illegally.
Officials of the Lagos State Taskforce on Fake, Counterfeit and Unwholesome Processed Foods raided the patent stores on Monday and shut them down for operating without being registered with the government.
Permanent Secretary, Lagos State Ministry of Health, Dr. Modele Osunkiyesi explained that the 29 shops were sealed off for various offences contrary to the provisions of the law on the operation of Pharmacies and Patent Medicine stores in Lagos State.
Osunkiyesi noted that the latest closure was coming on the heels of the government’s renewed mandate to the Taskforce to comb all nooks and crannies of the state for illegal patent medicine and pharmaceutical stores’ operators.
“The closure is part of the government’s efforts at ridding the state of fake, substandard and illegal drugs’ operators and outlets as well as ensuring high drug quality through sanitation and streamlining of drug distribution system in the state,” she said.
The Permanent Secretary noted that the sealing of fake pharmaceutical premises was in accordance with the provision of Chapter C34 of the Counterfeit, Fake Drugs and Unwholesome Processed Foods (Miscellaneous Provision) Act of 1999, Number 25.
Osunkiyesi added that the raid was necessitated by the persistent defiance of government’s stipulated regulation on drug production, importation, manufacture, sales or display for sales, hawking, distribution, adulteration, and possession of drugs by illegal operators.
According to Osunkiyesi, the shops were sealed off for offences ranging from sales of drugs without license from the regulatory authority; to failure or refusal to relocate from a market area and adherence to the mandated distance between a patent medicine shop and market place as stipulated by the law; and sales of counterfeit and fake …Read More
Source:: PM Newspaper
