Feature
Generic Drugs
Can (and should) Africa make its own medicines?
BMJ 2015; 350 doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmj.h2178 (Published 28 April 2015) Cite this as: BMJ 2015;350:h2178- Mara Kardas-Nelson, freelance journalist, USA
Support
for Africa producing medicines is in vogue these days. The World Health
Organization executive director, Margaret Chan, supports it.1
So does Michel Sidibé, head of UNAIDS. “The goal is to address health
inequities and build capacity to meet supply shortages for essential
health commodities that cannot be sourced reliably and sustainably from
outside the continent,” they wrote last year.1 Major international organisations and donors, from the UN Industrial Development Organization (Unido)2 to the German Federal Enterprise for International Cooperation,3
are providing technical assistance to make local production happen, and
the African Union has put together a business plan to spur its
implementation.4
The
rationale for local production is simple: it is assumed that big donors
bankrolling many of Africa’s programmes for HIV, tuberculosis, and
malaria, three of the continent’s biggest killers, won’t stick around
forever. Africa imports 70% of its drugs,5
and if African countries have to pick up more of the tab, some drugs
could instead be produced at home, bolstering local economies. Local
production might also provide a more steady supply of medicines,
ensuring that drugs are immediately available during local health
emergencies and even in the face of international shocks, such as when
the Chinese government closed down its chemical companies during the
Beijing Olympics, leading to shortages of active pharmaceutical
ingredients used by some African countries.6
Local
production could also give greater control to overstretched African
regulators, which are battling against low quality drugs, sometimes made
in far-off factories that are difficult to monitor.
