The Minister for Public Health last Friday ordered the immediate withdrawal of two hot-selling antibiotics from the market.  The drugs in question are the orange-red Amoxverse capsules and the red-orange Ampiverse of the amoxicillin and ampicillin families. The curious thing about these two drugs is that they are very familiar to many users, notably those who, generally in the difficulty of access to recognized drugs, turn to them with their easy access since they are sold on the streets.

These antibiotics of the ampicillin and amoxicillin families are in widespread use throughout Africa and are well known in Cameroon. The fact that their devastating effects have only been recently discovered, as per the act of the Minister of Public Health, clearly indicates that much harm had been done to the countless citizens in search of quality medicines. This brings back the whole issue of street side medicines to the table.

Over the years, the government has come up with several initiatives to dissuade  citizens from buying street side medicines just as it has also organized many campaigns to talk about the dangers of same, especially with regard to the origins of these medicines, their composition – which in many cases, does not comply with basic medical standards – and the conditions under which they are sold, because in many instances, these are exposed to the scotching heat as these are sold in open spaces along the streets and as such cause wide-ranging changes in chemical composition.

The Minister had never gone this far in his plea for a change of attitudes toward the consumption of street side medication. The fact that he very specifically and pointedly talked of the dangers posed by the use of these particular drugs on sale marks a new beginning in the fight against these drugs and is an initiative that must be taken up with the other important actors of the drug marketing sector. For, health cannot be the issue of the Minister alone.

All those involved in the drug distribution chain are therefore called to order and must form part of the watchdog in ensuring that only quality drugs are sold to a people already suffering under a groaning burden of poverty and which requires that the small money they have must be used in a way as to obtain the best results. By specifically naming the incriminated drugs was a way of putting a finger in the wound, unlike in the past when the phenomenon has been addressed in a general manner.

It is now necessary for all the stake-holders of the sector – health services administrators, drug manufacturers, drug control agencies and beneficiaries of health services – to mount a campaign to ensure that what is old or proposed to those in need is of quality and is adapted to what is sought after.