Health Ministry: It’s sickening
It reads like the plot of a medical crime drama: human immunoglobulin–a sensitive medication derived from blood plasma–is given to patients in Government-run hospitals and triggers serious adverse reactions. But it is not. It is true life unfolding in Sri Lanka.
It soon transpires that the drug was counterfeit, “imported”—or maybe not—on the basis of a 'fake' waiver of registration issued in the name of the National Medicines Regulatory Authority (NMRA) CEO. A part consignment was paid for with public funds. It was circulated among medical institutions through the Health Ministry’s own purchasing and distribution division. And some patients who received the injection suffered alarming side effects.
Had these adverse reactions not occurred, the entire consignment worth millions of taxpayer monies would have been dispensed to unsuspecting hospitals and staff. To date, there is opaqueness about what the vials contained. Health Minister Keheliya Rambukwella casually claimed that it was saline, like that makes it any better. But doctors say saline wouldn’t have caused negative side effects. And saline certainly wasn’t what was ordered and paid for.
This sordid episode is the worst outcome of what Minister Rambukwella had set in motion so far. Together with his handpicked appointees at the NMRA—a complete dismantling of the drugs regulatory mechanism has led to an unspecified number of medicines and devices being waved into the country without even basic supervision. The dangers were repeatedly flagged. Some of the country’s most senior doctors and leading medical associations, including colleges, warned the authorities that abandoning regulatory oversight in favour of ‘unvetted’ walk-in offers by ‘unvetted’ pharmaceutical companies would open the floodgates to low-quality, unsafe products that pose a serious danger to public health. This is the outcome: counterfeit medication of which neither source nor content is known.
Minister Rambukwella claimed that waivers of registration (WoR) were the only way to get medication speedily under the Indian Credit Line (ICL) to meet “emergency” needs. This charade continued even after there was no longer an “emergency”—just bad planning, poor administration and a contrived shortage to facilitate the continuance of irregular procurements and the gravy train. It is unclear how many of these ‘favoured’ drugs were even paid for by the ICL. As the latest incident shows, some of them could have been ghost shipments, purportedly from India.
The lack of transparency, the sheer audacity with which these purchases were made, the cockiness with which the drugs and devices were distributed and the glaring lack of disciplinary action against the wrongdoers now stand out starkly. Even the owner of the local company who supplied “human immunoglobulin”—or whatever it was—is walking free. It is the nadir of all that is terribly wrong in the health sector.
Much of these questionable medications were given to underprivileged patients who don’t have a voice. It remains uncertain how many more counterfeit products are in circulation, or who benefited. This is tantamount now to a complete breakdown in medical services provided by the Government. The fact that no action has been taken despite these aberrations being flagged directly with those at the very top of this administration is a national crime.