Pharmaceutical Council Seals 138 Pharmacies, Others In Delta

From Ochei Matthew, Asaba
The Pharmacists Council of Nigeria (PCN) has sealed 27 pharmacies and 111 patent medicine shops for various offences in Delta state.
Briefing journalists in Asaba at the end of the enforcement exercise, the Director and head of inspection and monitoring department, PCN, Pharm. Antonia Aruya, disclosed that 138 premise out of 162 premises visited were sealed for offences ranging from dispensing poisons without the supervision of a pharmacist.
Others were shut down for poor storage conditions, selling medicines above the approved list for patent medicine vendors, non-registration or renewal of premises with PCN among others.
Mrs Aruya corrected the perception of referring PCN as an association, saying: “Pharmacists Council of Nigeria is a Federal Government Parastatal charged with the responsibility of regulating and controlling the education, training and practice of Pharmacy in all its aspects and ramification as established by Pharmacists Council of Nigeria Act Cap P17,LFN, 2004 and is not an association I keep correcting this.”
She said that in Delta, the team discovered that many premises commenced operations without following laid-down guidelines, while many of the premises were located in environment that were not conducive for the sale medicine.
Aruya added that many others failed to meet minimum requirements for storage and personnel, thus exposing members of the public to the dangers of consuming medicines whose quality, safety and efficacy cannot be guaranteed.
She advised the public to patronise licensed pharmacies and patent medicine shop as drugs purchased elsewhere cannot be guaranteed to be safe for their use.
She urged all stakeholders to follow the laws that regulate the sale of medicines in Nigeria as she stressed that PCN would not tolerate the sale of medicines without submission to regulatory control.