Online Reporter
Wilson Chandomba
Correspondent
IMAGINE this: A mother in a local community buys medicine for her feverish child from a market stall. The packaging looks convincing, the price is affordable and the seller promises it will work quickly.
Days later, the fever worsens. The medicine, though appearing legitimate, turns out to be unsafe and ineffective. This imagined scene is, unfortunately, a reality that plays out in communities across Zimbabwe and beyond — often silently, and with devastating consequences.
Across the country and the continent, we face a persistent public health threat — substandard and falsified medical products (SFMPs). These are not just poor-quality medicines; they are a direct risk to life, eroding trust in health systems and undermining years of progress in public health.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) defines substandard medical products as those authorised by regulatory authorities but failing to meet quality standards or specifications. Falsified medical products are those that deliberately misrepresent their identity, composition, or source.
Both are dangerous, but their pathways into communities differ — requiring different prevention, detection, and response measures.
Substandard medicines may originate from genuine manufacturers but lose quality due to poor handling or storage along the supply chain. This risk is especially high for cold chain products such as vaccines, insulin, and certain antibiotics, which require strict temperature control from manufacturer to patient.
Falsified medicines, on the other hand, are deliberately fraudulent, often manufactured in unsafe conditions, and may contain the wrong ingredients — or none at all.
How do they reach the public?
SFMPs find their way into communities through both formal and informal channels. Some enter via poorly monitored import routes, others through mismanaged storage facilities, and many through informal markets where unlicensed vendors sell them without quality assurance.
In some cases, medicines are transported under unsafe conditions, losing their potency long before they reach the patient. In others, falsified products are deliberately introduced into the market, bypassing regulatory checks entirely.
The chain of events often involves multiple points where better vigilance could stop them — at ports of entry, in warehouses, during transportation, in retail outlets, or even at community level. This is why tackling SFMPs requires every link in the chain to work together.
The need for prevention, detection, and response
The fight against SFMPs must be multi-layered.
Prevention means strengthening regulations, improving inspections, ensuring safe and compliant storage and distribution, and raising awareness so that unsafe products are not purchased or handled.
Detection involves monitoring markets, inspecting pharmacies and warehouses, conducting laboratory tests, and encouraging communities to report suspicious products.
Response includes removing dangerous products from circulation, prosecuting offenders, and improving systems to prevent recurrence.
These actions are most effective when coordinated through a multi-stakeholder approach — uniting regulators, industry, enforcement agencies, and the public.
Everyone has a role to play
This fight cannot be won by regulators alone. It requires every sector to take responsibility and act.
Community Health workers and leaders — Educate households on the dangers of SFMPs and guide them towards safe, verified sources.
Pharmacists and doctors — Remain vigilant, identify, and report suspect products early, ensuring no unsafe medicine reaches patients.
Law Enforcement and judiciary — Investigate, prosecute, and deter those who deliberately produce, smuggle, or sell falsified medicines.
Customs, port, and border control authorities — Intercept unsafe products before they cross into circulation.
Logistics service providers, truck drivers, and bus operators — Refuse to transport or conceal medicines from unlicensed sources. Report suspicious consignments immediately — becoming a first line of defence against unsafe products.
Vendors — Do not sell or promote medicines under any circumstances. Leave medicine supply to licensed establishments that can guarantee safety and quality.
Consumers — Desist from buying medicines from street markets or unlicensed sellers. Always purchase from licensed pharmacies, clinics, or authorised health facilities.
Media and civil society — Keep the public informed through sustained, accurate, and accessible awareness campaigns in both rural and urban areas.
When each of us plays our part — whether by refusing to handle unsafe goods, by educating our communities, or by insisting on verified supply channels — we close the gaps that SFMPs exploit. Together, we become a stronger, more effective shield for public health.
Supply reduction and demand reduction
Tackling SFMPs is not only about catching them once they appear — it’s also about making it harder for them to exist in the first place.
Supply reduction means tightening border controls, improving import and export monitoring, regulating wholesalers, and enforcing penalties for those found dealing in unsafe products. It requires cooperation between customs, police, port authorities, and international networks such as INTERPOL.
Demand reduction means ensuring the public understands the dangers of buying medicines from unreliable sources. This includes sustained awareness campaigns, community engagement, and making quality-assured medicines more accessible and affordable.
By reducing both supply and demand, we can significantly shrink the market for SFMPs.
A collaborative approach brings multiple benefits:
- Information sharing between regulators, health professionals, and enforcement agencies ensures quicker responses to threats.
- Joint training programmes for supply chain actors improve storage, distribution, and inspection practices.
- Community engagement builds trust and strengthens early-warning systems.
- International cooperation helps track cross-border movement of unsafe products.
A practical example of collaboration could be a national workshop bringing together all stakeholders — Government, regulators, healthcare workers, transport operators, vendors, consumer groups, the judiciary, and the media.
Such a platform would allow stakeholders to map responsibilities, agree on shared protocols, and commit to an action plan for prevention, detection, and response.
A call to action
Every unsafe medicine kept out of circulation is a life potentially saved. Every informed consumer is a barrier to the spread of SFMPs.
This is not a fight for one sector alone — it is a shared responsibility. Let us unite as pharmacists, doctors, customs officers, truck drivers, vendors, community leaders, judges, journalists, and consumers to ensure that only safe, effective and quality-assured medicines reach the people of Zimbabwe.
All hands on deck. The health of our nation depends on it.
Wilson Chandomba is an expert member of the Africa Continental Technical Working Group on Substandard and Falsified Medical Products & Chairperson of the Communications Sub-Group
