By Abdulai Fofanah
Freetown, 21st October, 2026 – The Pharmacy and Drugs Act 2001 review is underway, with the Pharmacy Board of Sierra Leone pushing for the creation of two acts: the regulation of drugs and the pharmacy profession. A move aimed at addressing deficiencies in the current act, such as counterfeit drugs, illicit sales of drugs by hawkers, modern challenges, among others.
Discussing the current act, the Registrar of the Pharmacy Board of Sierra Leone, Dr. James Peter Komeh, said the current act is obsolete and does not capture everything that has to do with health, especially for workers when it comes to capturing drug peddlers. “We don’t even have the right because it is not in the act,” he said. “We have to meet police to make arrest.”
He also said that one of the major things they grapple with is drug peddling, noting that the fine in the current act is 500 thousand old leones, which he said people could easily afford to pay whenever they are dragged to court. He said that even though they had signed an MoU with the police, there are still challenges with a lot of changes happening in the pharmaceutical sector, which has led to the review of the act.
The Chairman of the Pharmacy Board of Sierra Leone, Dr. Moses N. P. Batema, stated that in the entire subregion, Sierra Leone is the only country still regulating the pharmacy profession and pharmacy products with the same act and the same institution. He said it is very challenging and difficult to decide whether to focus on the products or people.
“It is difficult for one institution, especially when there are human resource constraints,” he noted, stating that is the reason the Board recommended to the Ministry of Health to separate drug regulation and the pharmacy profession. He said that the Ministry had accepted the proposal and the Cabinet had approved it. He was speaking at a press conference held at the National Medical Supply Agency in New England Ville, 21st October, 2026.
Dr. Batema stated that the Board is in the process of working with the Attorney General and Minister of Justice, Alpha Sesay Esq., to create the two acts: an agency to regulate pharmacy products and the pharmacy council for pharmacy practitioners. He also stated that they are in an advanced stage with the acts, working with their partners, such as the African Union, West African Health Organization, experts and the World Health Organization in Sierra Leone.
“Hopefully, this year or next year, we will have two brand new acts to make us regulate the space,” he said, stating that the acts would make it easier for them to institute stronger sanctions against people who are not doing the right thing in the profession. “It will allow creating a fair process for anybody doing pharmacy business,” he said. It would be a fair and transparent process by which one would be called to account.
“There are things the Pharmacy Board is doing right now, which are not even covered by law. Hopefully, by the time the acts are passed, everything is covered now by law,” he said.
