The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) has promised to fast-track the laboratory examination of the drug, named Covid Organics from Madagascar.
The agency’s Director of Public Relations, Dr Abubakar Jimoh, who stood in for the agency’s Director-General, Prof Mojisola Adeyeye, explained that the agency would prioritize the laboratory examination of the product once it received it from the authorities.
He said, “When the drug arrives, it will go to the Minister of Health who will in turn hand it over to NAFDAC through the PTF. It is after that we would start our laboratory examination. It will be subjected to the normal procedure.
“We would expedite action on this because everyone is anxiously waiting for the result. We would speed it up but it will still have to go through the normal laboratory analysis and medical evaluation.
“Unlike the orthodox medicine, with the herbal medicine, it is given linctus status, it is not given full registration and that means it has a life span of two years, unlike normal drug that has a life span of five years. So, this is what will be applicable to the Madagascar drug. We would ensure that the claims being made are true.”
When asked how long it could take for the laboratory examination to be concluded, he said the normal procedure was three months but that given the situation at hand, the process would be prioritized without compromising the efficiency of the process.
Recall that President Muhammadu Buhari, on Saturday at the State House, Abuja, received the Madagascan native formulation against the COVID-19 pandemic and reiterated that he will listen to science before allowing traditional or any new medicines to be administered on Nigerians.
At an audience meeting with President Umaro Sissoco Embalo of Guinea Bissau who brought along with him the samples of the traditional medicine as shared to African nations by Madagascar, President Buhari said his position on all such herbal or traditional medicinal postulates had remained the same.
