HEALTH-MALAWI: Quest for Cheap AIDS Treatment Fuels Fake Drugs Boom

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Brian Ligomeka

BLANTYRE, Jul 23 2003 (IPS) - Many Malawians living with HIV/AIDS are forced to rely on illegal drugs in a bid to treat opportunistic illnesses, ease suffering and prolong their lives.

Some of the fake drugs have flooded the country’s parallel market with a potentially disastrous health impact.

A lack of recognised cheap drugs in many hospitals, clinics and health centres, coupled with their costs in the marketplace is driving many Malawians with HIV/AIDS into the arms of unlicensed drug peddlers offering dubious cures.

In Malawi, where one million out of a population of 11 million carry HIV/AIDS virus, people have been flocking to buy fake, illegal and even expired drugs from drug peddlers, ignoring warnings from the ministry of health and police.

Attempts by authorities to crack down on the illegal sales of such drugs have proven unsuccessful.

A drug particularly doing well on the parallel market is Conthy Capsule, a traditional Chinese medicine reported to have been developed by the Beijing Jinjiang Xini Pharmaceutical Company.

Conthy Capsules are also stocked secretly by some privately owned hospitals and clinics in the commercial city of Blantyre and capital Lilongwe. A packet of 20 Conthy Capsules cost up to 5, 000 Malawi Kwacha (55.5 U.S. dollars) on the parallel market.

The drug is not on the approved list of the Central Government Stores and not registered with the Malawi Pharmacy, Medicines and Poisons Board.

A senior medical practitioner in Blantyre, Dr Charles Nyirenda said the drug is used mainly to boost immunity. “It is not treated as a drug in China, but a vitamin,” he said.

A leaflet accompanying the capsules claims: “The results of pharmacological experiments and clinical trials showed that Conthy Capsule could kill human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) effectively and raise the number of cells rapidly.”

“It has been used to prevent and treat AIDS in the USA, Africa, South East Asia and many hospitals in Yunnan and Guanngi provinces of China. The clinical trial proved that it was more effective in treating and preventing carcinoma of the stomach, hepatocarcinoma and mastrocarcinoma. It maybe used simultaneously with radiotherapy, chemotherapy and surgical operation,” the leaflet says.

Another drug, which Malawians believe alleviates the symptoms of some of the opportunistic infections, such as diarrhoea and tuberculosis, that appears in the early stages of AIDS is a combination of Rifampicin and IHN, which are normally used to cure tuberculosis. The preparation is known variously as Rifinah and Bazuka. Each capsule costs as little as 10 Malawi Kwacha (0.1 U.S. cent).

Programme Manager for Tuberculosis in Malawi, Dr Felix Salaniponi has said that while the combination of Rifampicin and IHN, when properly used effectively cures TB, it is downright dangerous to try to treat HIV/AIDS-related illnesses.

Dr Salaniponi says the use of these drugs by those living with HIV/AIDS and those suffering from sexually transmitted diseases has led to the emergence of a dangerous strain of multi-resistant TB.

“Ten patients diagnosed in the past 12 months have developed a multi-drug resistant type of tuberculosis. Research has shown that patients with this type of TB at one time or the other used Rifinah in an attempt to cure HIV/AIDS-related illnesses or some sexually transmitted diseases,” he said.

AIDS drugs that are popular in industrialised countries such as AZT, which has government approval are only found in Malawi’s referral hospitals and cosy private hospitals. The drugs are so expensive (some hospitals pegging them at a monthly fee of 100 U.S. dollars) that they are virtually inaccessible to the masses, 60 percent of whom live on less than a dollar per day.

Meanwhile, the government continues to appeal to international donor agencies and multinational drug companies to make available cheaper therapies.

The Health and Population Ministry has stepped up efforts to inform the public about the dangers of buying drugs from unlicensed dealers.

“The illegal sale of drugs is boosted by people who buy from unlicensed peddlers and the street vendors and that is why we will be tackling the problem from this angle, rather than merely arresting peddlers,” says Health Minister Yusuf Mwawa.

He warns that those buying illegal drugs should shoulder the consequences of their actions as they are well informed that government’s referral hospitals are only legitimate places they can get anti-HIV/AIDS drugs.

But the quest for AIDS and life prolonging drugs is driving people to take any drug that makes a name on the parallel market.

Several years ago, Marindiana smuggled from Uganda, flooded the cities of Mzuzu, Blantyre and Lilongwe. And at the onset of HIV/AIDS pandemic in Malawi over 700, 000 Malawians visited a herbalist, called Chisupe, who claimed that the spirits of his ancestors had revealed to him names of herbs that could cure AIDS.

Many people still visit witchdoctors and herbalists who claim that they have cures. One of such traditional herbal concoctions selling like hot cakes is called Maju.

Despite flocking to these quack doctors to buy drugs, the disease has reached crisis proportions. As a result, productivity and labour force are declining, while health expenditure is increasing – the country spends 30 percent of its dwindling health budget on coping with the effects of HIV/AIDS scourge.

Some local observers believe that in the continued quest for HIV/AIDS cure, concerted efforts between scientific medical professions and traditional healers ought to be encouraged in Malawi.

Others believe that rich nations hold the key to solving the AIDS crisis through the provision of free anti-HIV/AIDS drugs.