FG to clamp down on substandard testing equipments

The lab, expected to be commissioned in Lagos this September by President Goodluck Jonathan, will clinically validate in-vitro diagnostics [IVD] (equipment for laboratory tests) and continue to evaluate them after they have gone on the market.“With the facility now ready, it will no longer be business as usual,” said MLSCN registrar, Prof Anthony Emeribe, insisting […]

The lab, expected to be commissioned in Lagos this September by President Goodluck Jonathan, will clinically validate in-vitro diagnostics [IVD] (equipment for laboratory tests) and continue to evaluate them after they have gone on the market.
“With the facility now ready, it will no longer be business as usual,” said MLSCN registrar, Prof Anthony Emeribe, insisting the lab will mark a turning point in Nigeria’s quest for quality medical laboratory services.
In a release signed by the head of corporate affairs, Mrs Fidelia Ginikanwa, it reads, “The council is moving to sanitize that aspect of the sector; and in order to achieve the goal, the National Regulatory Agency has articulated a comprehensive policy aimed at ensuring that only IVDs-equipment, kits, reagents and consumables that meet international standards would henceforth be allowed to be manufactured, imported, distributed or used in the country.”
“A situation where our country represents a dumping ground for all manners of fake and substandard IVDs from all the nooks and crannies of the world is worrisome,” he noted.
 The registrar of MLSCN, which regulates the practice of medical laboratory science in Nigeria, said, “The production, importation and distribution of IVDs are so pivotal to quality diagnosis to be left unregulated. “Apparently, the current state of medical laboratory services sector is somewhat chaotic, which is unacceptable.
“Expectedly, the situation is also attracting the attention of well-meaning Nigerians. And rightly so, we have to pay adequate attention to the standard of IVDs-equipment kits, reagents and consumables that are in use in Nigeria if we hope to get accurate, reliable and reproducible results and reports from them.”