From Sylvia Udegbunam Enugu

The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) has destroyed fake, adulterated and unregistered food, drugs and cosmetic products worth N2,664,548,683 seized in the South-East.Setting the products on fire at the Enugu State Refuse Dumpsite in Ugwuonyeama in Enugu on Thursday, the Director-General of NAFDAC, Prof.

Mojisola Adeyeye, said that the products would had compromised the health of over three million people. Adeyeye, represented by Director of NAFDAC South-East Zone, Martins Iluyomade, said that the destroyed products would have increased the health burden on the already overstretched health institutions in the country.According to her, these destroyed products will have increased the poverty rate by making people spend money they should use to improve their livelihoods on medical trips.”It is also pertinent to know that several people have lost their lives and met their untimely death due to the consumption of these poisons.”This event today is to signal to the people of the South-East that it is no longer business as usual to merchants of death who are hell bent on destroying other people for their own selfish economic gain.”I want to thank other sister agencies for the synergy and inter agency cooperation without which we cannot succeed in this endeavour.”NAFDAC will not rest on its oars until every household in Nigeria can buy any regulated product without fear of substandard and adulteration or fake.”We enjoin the public to join us in this fight by reporting unscrupulous manufacturers and business men who engage in illicit practices to report to the nearest NAFDAC office for prompt investigation,” she said.Director of NAFDAC South-East Zone, Martins Iluyomade, said that South-East states are very strategic to achieving the mandate of NAFDAC.Iluyomade noted that “if the work of NAFDAC is achieved in the South-East, 70 per cent of the mandate of the Agency is already achieved”.”Several raids and routine activities have led to the confiscation of several fake, substandard, falsified, adulterated and spurious foods, drugs, medical devices, cosmetics, chemicals and other regulated consignments.”These products are very injurious to the health of Nigerians and especially to the people of the South-East,” he said.