FDA must extend its recent enforcement exercises to include illegal drug dealing

Two recent exercises conducted by the Food and Drugs Authority (FDA) have renewed my faith in the abilities of our public institutions to rise to the occasion when the leadership is poised to discharge their mandates.

As reported in the Ghanaian Times on August 18, 2024, the FDA, after much surveillance, arrested operators of nineteen Accra and Kasoa-based entertainment facilities for permitting smoking on their premises.

The hefty administrative fines totalling GH¢457,000.00 would definitely communicate the degree of abhorrence of the persistent exposure of members of the public to the risk of second-hand smoking.

The action of the FDA, more importantly, exposed the public to the existence of virtually unknown but important enactments aimed at protecting our health.

The outcome of the enforcement exercise would, for a long time, rattle the entertainment establishment and serve notice that there is a high price to pay for endangering the health of patrons of entertainment houses.

The Authority was again in the news a month later for closing down four Osu-based supermarkets which had stocked unregistered Chinese-labelled drugs, food, and tobacco in clear breaches of the Public Health Act, 2012 (Act 851) as well as LI 154.

The stockists were required to pay administrative fines of GH¢25,000 each. It is hoped that the promised exercise to unearth the sources of the products will lead to the exposure of public officials whose complicity contributed to the endangerment of lives.

While the FDA deserves our commendation on the two occasions, it is important to remind the leadership that it cannot continue to shirk its responsibility for protecting the public from the dangers of unrestrained peddling of drugs in the public space.

The peddlers audaciously canvass for sales at transport hubs, marketplaces, street corners, and unlicensed information centres. The Weija junction and the stretch between Awutu Beraku and Buduburam are notorious for the conduct of such illegal activities.

The Authority must monitor and raid the many shops which deal in expired, unregistered drugs and unapproved herbal preparations.

The FDA would do Ghanaians a world of good by sensitising the public on the dangers of patronising unregistered and unapproved drugs and medications, especially herbal preparations.

Additionally, the Authority must establish hotlines in its quest to protect public health.