Counterfeit Drugs Causing Drug Resistant Strains of TB

The proliferation of counterfeit drugs used for the treatment of tuberculosis in Africa is causing the rise of extremely resistant strains of TB.

Jeff Otieno reports in the Daily Nation on September 27th about an already serious health care problem becoming much more serious due to substandard, adulterated, fraudulent and counterfeit medications.

The major concern is that while easily and inexpensively treated TB can grow into an un-manageable disease when the drugs used to counter it are counterfeit.

As reported in the Daily Nation:

• Treatment drugs are becoming weaker by the day. Such is the case with two types of tuberculosis, multi-drug resistant TB and extremely resistant TB, which are on the rise not only in the East Africa, but also globally.

• “Drug resistant tuberculosis cases are spreading. We have already seen a rise in Kenya and we believe the case is the same in other parts of East Africa,” says Dr Joseph Sitienei, the head of the National Leprosy and Tuberculosis Control Programme.

• Extremely resistant TB is caused by poor treatment, mis-diagnosis and the unwitting use of counterfeit drugs. It is a case where a normal TB disease transforms itself becoming resistant.

Populations around the globe should be concerned because drug resistant strains of diseases transcend borders and quickly spread beyond underdeveloped nations.

Counterfeit medications are increasingly becoming one of the most dangerous health care issues of the 21st century.

To read the entire Daily Nation article, visit: http://www.nation.co.ke/News/Spread%20of%20resistant%20tuberculosis%20fails%20to%20catch%20world%20attention%20/-/1056/1019204/-/10aq73p/-/.

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