Ever since 70 Gambian infants perished after taking four brands of Indian cough syrups contaminated with toxic substances, there has been a decidely grim public fascination with the country’s beleaguered healthcare system.
At the best of times, Gambia’s health practitioners had never enjoyed a strong vote of confidence from the public and the fallout from the cough syrup scandal has left a bitter tase in the mouth.
Trust in the health system is at an all-time low as a miasma of despair hangs over the country where the general feeling is one of growing resignation that the death toll from the syrups is set to rise further.
The cough syrup fatalities first came to the attention of the health ministry in July.
But the storm raised two months later by a concerted international media coverage about a WHO global red alert to the syrups sent the government in Banjul into overdrive.
Its officials have since been scrambling for the right responses to deal with the crisis and allay the bitterness being felt in many quarters.
”This is an unfolding tragedy and we have not seen the end of it” warns an angry father of two, who says the government was only acting because the eyes of the world are fixed on how Gambia was going to respond to this embarassing lapse in judgment by the national health authorities.
The 37-year-old teacher who requests anonymity says he has instructed all members of his family to stop using all medicines lest they are contaminated the same way the cough syrups have been found to be unsafe.
So deep is the level of distrust for public health facilities in The Gambia that more and more adults have become wary of medicines from hospitals run by the state irregardless of whether they have been prescribed for use.
In angry despair over the cough syrup tragedy, Awa Batchilly like many Gambians believes that the whole saga was an accident waiting to happen and exposed the worst of the country’s health system – incompetence, lack of interest, bribery and corruption.
The mother of one tells the African Press Agency that she is returning to herbs since the worthiness of medical drugs coming into the country cannot be guaranteed by those tasked with the responsibility of raising a red flag on them when things go wrong.
”We have reached a point where we cannot leave to chance anything about our health” she adds.
With more infants linked to the syrups admitted to intensive care units in hospitals across the country, it is feared that the death toll may rise and with it the anger and frustration of a population still waiting for answers to questions being asked about the conduct of health professionals when over 50, 000 of those drugs were imported from India earlier this year.
Gambians feel they know who should be fingered over the ”incompetence, negligence, dereliction of duty and corruption” that led to what they see as an otherwise avoidable tragedy claiming the lives of children, the weakest in any society.
Critics are fastening their gaze on President Adama Barrow who was expected to wield the axe and fell heads beginning with the underfire Health minister Ahmadou Samateh who has dismissed calls for his resignation.
They cannot fathom why the shipment of unsafe medicines to the country was cleared without rigorous checks being applied by the health authorities to ascertain their worthiness of use by an unsuspecting population.
”If those syrups can be brought to the country without being tested for safety, how sure are we that other medicines finding their way here are safe” said a 36-year old mother who claims she knows one of the parents whose ill-fated children had died using the contaminated syrups.
Although the syrups have been recalled, the importer’s license suspended and the Indian company closed as investigations continue, many in The Gambia think the reaction is as futile as locking the stable door after the horse has bolted.
The Gambia has a Medicines Control Agency whose stated mandate since a 2014 Act of Parliament is to control the manufacture, importation, exportation, distribution, use and advertisements of medicines and related products with a view to improving their quality, safety, and efficacy for consumers.
Investigations have established that the 50,000 cough syrup bottles from the Indian manufacturer Maiden Pharmaceutical were imported into the country by the American-owned Atlantic Pharmaceutical.
Over 41, 000 them have been impounded by the police but 8, 000 bottles of the syrup are still unaccounted for.
45 percent of all generic drugs to Africa originates from India.
The medicine regulatory bodies and the health ministry are being criticised for not being vigilant about the syrups and their maker whose reputation in other countries does not make good rating.
There has been a red flag over its products in Vietnam and other countries where they were found to have been sub-standard, unfit for use and therefore banned.
Gambia’s MCA says its focus has been on drugs treating malaria and other painkilling pills and antibiotics.
Meanwhile, President Barrow has said a mechanism is in the works to preempt this kind of laxity in the future but for Gambians the damage has already been done and their confidence in the public health system would take some time before it is restored.
WN/as/APA