Citation: Newton PN, Green MD, Fernandez F (2007) Counterfeit Artemisinin Derivatives and Africa: Update from Authors. PLoS Med 4(3): e139. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmed.0040139
Published: March 27, 2007
Copyright: © 2007 Newton et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Funding: The authors received no specific funding for this article.
Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
Since the publication of our article on counterfeit artesunate in June 2006 [1], further information has become available which we would like to report, as it has public health significance. An additional two counterfeit artesunate “types” with distinguishing features of the packaging have been found in mainland Southeast Asia, bringing the number of physical types to at least 14. For details see “Fake Artesunate Warning Sheet Number 5a” [2], an update (dated August 2006) to that published as supplementary material to the above paper.
In addition, we would like to bring readers' attention to the newspaper reports of counterfeit artesunate and dihydroartemisinin seized from ladies' handbags at Lagos airport [3].
References
- 1. Newton PN, McGready R, Fernandez F, Green MD, Sunjio M, et al. (2006) Manslaughter by fake artesunate in Asia—Will Africa be next? PLoS Med 3: e197.
- 2.
Wellcome Trust Oxford SE Asian Tropical Medicine Research Units (2006) Fake artesunate warning sheet number 5a. Available: http://www.tropicalmedicine.ox.ac.uk//FakeArtesunateWarningJan07.pdf. Accessed 23 February 2007.
- 3.
Oyeniran M (2006 September 28) NAFDAC seizes N3m malaria drugs. Nigerian Tribune.