The Pharmacy Council of Nigeria (PCN) said it had shut down a total of 19,059 illegal premises across the country in the last four years.
The registrar of the council, Pharm Ibrahim Babashehu Ahmed, stated this yesterday during the presentation of the gazetted PCN (Establishment) Act 2022 in Abuja.
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He stated, “From 2018 and yesterday, a total of 27, 262 facilities were visited for enforcement activities. Out of this number, we have closed down a total of 19, 059 of them.”
The registrar said that out of the illegal premises shut down, 1, 780 were premises sealed for operating illegally as pharmaceutical premises, while 16, 502 others that were sealed were patent medicine shops.
He said that within the period under review, a total 110 persons were arrested by the council and are at various stages of prosecution.
The chairman of the Governing Council of the organisation, Professor Ahmed Tijjani Mora, said that with the new act, the PCN is now called Pharmacy Council of Nigeria and no longer Pharmacists Council of Nigeria.
He said the new act had empowered the council to regulate not just pharmacists but all stakeholders involved in the pharmacy distribution chain, such as pharmacy technicians and patent medicine vendors, manufacturers and importers, among others.
