From Fred Ezeh, Abuja
National Agency for Food and Drugs Administration and Control (NAFDAC) said, yesterday, that its vaccine laboratory is 70 per cent completed and would be ready in six months time.
It is optimistic that it will attain the enviable status of Maturity Level 4 (ML4) as soon as possible and will be certified by the World Health Organisation (WHO) to begin production of vaccines and other pharmaceuticals products.
NAFDAC Director General, Mojisola Adeyeye, at a meeting with major players in the nation’s pharmaceutical industry, under the aegis of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Group-Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (PMG-MAN), solicited support and collaborations to the desire of NAFDAC to attain WHO ML4 as quickly as possible.
She said NAFDAC is the only agency in sub-Sahara Africa that has its own in-house biologics and vaccine laboratory.
“We have a lot going for us as a country. We just have to get our acts together and start producing vaccines and other pharmaceuticals products, and I know it’s a lot of work,’’ she said.
Adeyeye, in a statement by the Resident Media Consultant of NAFDAC, Sayo Akintola, said the agency just met all the requirement of WHO’s Maturity Level 3 (ML3), stressing that while doing that, the agency got some requirements also satisfied under ML4, but not all.
“It means our journey is not going to be as difficult as it was for the last four plus years,’’ she said.
She emphasised the importance of WHO ML4 which, according to her, would further boost the trade aspect of the Nigeria’s pharmaceutical industry without diminishing its health implications for the Nigerian populace.
“Nigerians would be more confident of the medicines that they take since the process embarked upon by the agency is aimed at mitigating against substandard and falsified medicines to a very low prevalence,” she said.
She disclosed that it took Ghana 13 years to get ML3, while it took Nigeria four years to attain the prestigious status, adding that achieving ML4 will really help the country’s manufacturing industry to grow.
“It will also help importers that are migrating from importation of pharmaceutical products to local manufacturing, in terms of trade,’’ she said.