Mchinji District Hospital on Thursday last week burnt expired drugs worth K28 million which it received from donors and purchased from the Central Medical Stores Trust.
The ceremony, which took place at the hospital’s dumping site, was witnessed by officials from the district hospital, district council, Treasury, Police and Pharmacy and Poisons Board, among other among other stakeholders.
The district hospital’s Public Relations Officer, Owen Chataika said it was ideal to burn the drugs because they expired and were deemed poisonous for human consumption.
He further said apart from expiring of some drugs, others have been burnt after the change of regimens like Sulphadoxine Pyrimethatrine (SP) and Lamefantrine Artemether (LA).
Among other drugs the hospital burnt were pain killers, injections, antiretroviral drugs, TB drugs and Malaria drugs.
According to the Chataika, most of the burnt drugs were donations from different development partners which came in large quantities but only had a year to expire.
“We are not saying donations are bad, but most of the drugs that we receive are in large quantities and also they come when they will soon get expired. This looks like we are failing to use them and this is the end result,” he said.
