NAFDAC, SON must sit up

IT is worrisome that Nigerian markets are flooded with uncertified, unregistered and harmful products, regularly used by its teeming citizens. This is taking a heavy toll on the health and wellbeing of the populace.

Specifically, I am referring to skin-care products and other cosmetics, food and medicinal drugs, among others, which are not approved by regulatory agencies such as the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) and the Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON).

But the manufacturers or producers of these harmful products are not to be blamed. SON and NAFDAC should be called out for compromising their oversight mandates. Their failure to ascertain the safety, quality and standards of these products used by citizens is responsible for the sickness and death of many.

In Nigeria, we feel the pain of rudderless and weak regulation in many areas. It appears that those who are given the duty to regulate even connive with dubious manufacturers to cut corners. And whenever this occurs, society is shortchanged and the people are left to live with the unpleasant consequences of such.

Not long ago, some Nigerian scientists raised the alarm over food processors and sellers in the country using toxic chemicals to improve the look of food items, including cassava flour, beans and fish. The experts explained that with the practice, millions of people are subjected to the risk of experiencing kidney problems and cancer.

According to them, weak government testing capacities and informal food supply chains leave traders and fishermen with little oversight and offer almost no protection to unwary consumers. It is no longer news that many of the toxic chemicals added as preservatives to the food we consume as citizens are not safe for human consumption.

Although Nigeria lacks accurate statistics on the health effects of these toxic preservatives in foods, there is an increase in diseases such as cancer, birth defects, kidney failure and diabetes in children. These diseases don’t just happen. It is a function of what an individual breathes in or eats.

Toxic preservatives have cumulative negative effects on the body; they do not kill immediately they are taken. This is something that we need to take more seriously. It is something that is very scary.

By the time the effect on the kidney or liver starts to show, maybe 10 or 15 years after, only a few individuals will link it to what was eaten in the past.

For example, the use of antibiotics in raising fishes poses a challenge to human health as it builds a kind of resistance to the proper use of antibiotics in humans. By the time such fish is ready for the market, there is no time for the withdrawal period to ensure the effect of the drug given has waned. In developed countries, antibiotics are not licensed for raising fish for consumption. Drugs are only licensed for use in ornamental fish and that are not meant to be consumed.

Again, Nigerians should be concerned about the public health implication of bleaching creams. There have been a number of reports raising concerns over the safety of the ingredients used for such and the damages they cause on our health.

A large number of cosmetics with potentially harmful ingredients are used in hairdressing, skincare and nails services. Beauty professionals, as well as cosmetics users are the ones constantly exposed to these harmful chemical ingredients.

In the light of the above gloomy reality, one is forced to ask: what is SON doing, and what could have gone wrong at NAFDAC? In the era of Professor Dora Akunyili, Nigerians, for the first time, saw how a regulatory agency pursued its activities with a crusading spirit alien to the world of public service. Nigerians also saw how the fear of NAFDAC in that era made fake drugs and food dealers’ tremble. For quite some time, this crusade flavour in NAFDAC’s activities has not been visible.

Despite their lacklustre performance lately, SON and NAFDAC should not continue to sit back and watch activities in their areas of mandate deteriorate. The volume of sub-standard goods that have made their way into the country and even those that are even produced within is worrying. It is the duty of these regulatory agencies to constantly intervene in what takes place in areas under their purview, with the objective of sanitising such affairs and ensuring that parties play the game according to the rules.

Let those at the helm of affairs in these regulatory agencies sit up and not be laid back, or see their domain as a rent post carved out for their selfish pursuit. Also, political leaders should take with seriousness the process of appointing helmsmen and women for regulatory agencies.

Heads of such agencies must show passion, be focused and not be people who seek enrichment through the office. And even when appointed, such helmsmen and women in regulatory agencies must be under periodic review, to ensure that the society is not impacted upon negatively on account of their poor performance.

It is not too late for both SON and NAFDAC to get their acts right. Nigerians cannot continue to die or battle various diseases or ailments as a result of neglect by these agencies. They should both sit up and do the needful.