As the World Health Organization celebrates World Diabetes Day, on the 14 of November 2021,with the theme for this year through 2023 as 'Access to Diabetes Care: If not now, when?', the Association of Community Pharmacists of Nigeria,(ACPN) has called on the Minister of Health, Dr. Osagie Ehanire, to order the immediate closure of all Open Drug Markets in Nigeria, so as to be able to appeal to the healthcare situation, and indeed diabetes care in the country.
They made the call in a release made available to CEOAFRICA and signed by the association's National Chairman,
Pharm Adewale `Oladigbolu, FPSN.
While lamenting the poor state of diabetes care in the country,the association said
"This theme is succinct and appeals to the healthcare situation, and indeed diabetes care in our country , Nigeria is very low as the nation records more than most countries of the world with 5.8% (about 6Million) of adult Nigerians are said to be diabetic.
"This figure has been likened to the tip of the iceberg as it is estimated that two-third of the diabetes cases in Nigeria remain undiagnosed.
"Nearly 100 years after the discovery of insulin and other diabetes control medications, they remain largely unavailable and unaffordable for the majority of Nigerians.
"The complete confusion and disorderliness in the drug distribution system in Nigeria have worsened the quality of most valuable pharmaceutical products designed to alleviate the suffering of diabetic patients and have made it very difficult for these patients to get to treatment goals."
They further noted the failed efforts by the government and it's health regulatory bodies to check the sales of medicines in the open market.
"Many of the antidiabetics are temperature sensitive and the lack of effort by the Federal Ministry of Health in ensuring that medicines are not sold in the open markets means many of these medications may have lost a substantial part of their potency before reaching the final users, this situation is dangerous, should not be and should not be allowed to continue.
"The situation of diabetes care in Nigeria is simply put sub-optimal: inequality and lack of access to diabetes care, high cost of medicines, lack of quality assurance checks for service providers in the healthcare system, and disorderly drug distribution system with its siamese twin of a pool of poor medicines."
ACPN, therefore called on the Minister for Health, Dr. Osagie Ehanire, to immediately order the closure of all Open Drug Markets in Nigeria, as failure to do so would be toying and endangering of the lives of ordinary Nigerians.
"We also call on the Ministry of Health to call the National Health Insurance Scheme to order on the misinterpretation of her guideline and the misdirection of her payment mechanism that has kept the coverage of health insurance in Nigeria at the abysmal level and undermined the well being of people living with diabetes."
The association further stated that Community Pharmacists are accessible to the people and their knowledge, skill and setups are suitable for diabetes education, noting that the ACPN has commissioned a countrywide Community Pharmacy-Based Diabetes Education Program, which is a 12-month, individualized care program based on Standardised Diabetes Self-Management Education Programs.
" This collaborative study will enroll over One Thousand Diabetic Patients Nationwide and it will be characterized by baseline clinical and pharmacotherapy assessments/assessment of baseline diabetes knowledge of these patients, Community Pharmacists interventions {Diabetes Education/Pharmaceutical care} at scheduled visits, and the results of changes in clinical values and quality of lives of the patients at the end of the study.
"We look forward to collaboration from Pharmaceutical companies and other healthcare professionals for this important study." They added.
