Will blockchain fight drug counterfeiting in Africa?

One in 10 medical products in low- and middle-income countries, which includes most of Africa, is substandard or fake, leading to at least 100,000 deaths on the continent, the World Health Organization (WHO) says. Moreover, 42% of all counterfeit medicines reported to the WHO between 2013 and 2017 were from Africa.

At his friend’s pharmacy in Ghana, Dare Odumade witnessed the death of a patient whose kidney ruptured due to a counterfeit malaria drug.

In 2018, he founded Chekkit, a Nigeria-based B2B software company to provide product authentication and distribution tracking solutions to FMCGs and pharmaceuticals. With Chekkit’s technology, patients and medics are able to identify fakes – the company raised a $500,000 pre-seed in 2021 to improve its blockchain-powered technology.

At the time of pre-seed, Chekkit revealed that it has secured around seven million pharmaceutical products and protected over 200,000 consumers. The company also expanded its offer to Afghanistan.

Recently, a Nigerian health technology company, Afrihealth, launched Rigour+ for manufacturers. Rigour+ is a blockchain-backed serialization technology that addresses drug counterfeiting, which costs the global pharmaceutical industry around $200 billion annually.

“By assigning a unique identifier to each unit of product, manufacturers and importers can track their products throughout the supply chain in real time. The app’s innovative geofencing tool takes this a step further by allowing manufacturers to monitor the geographic journey of their products, ensuring that they stays within intended market limits, says Linda Obi, CEO of Afrihealth.

Uses blockchain against counterfeit medicines

According to Obi, who is also a blockchain expert:

Blockchain technology is emerging as a revolutionary force in the global fight against drug counterfeiting. Leveraging its unique features of transparency, traceability and security, it promises to significantly strengthen the integrity of the pharmaceutical supply chain.

• Outstanding transparency: Blockchain acts as a decentralized ledger that records every step of a drug’s journey from the manufacturing unit to the end consumer. This ledger is shared simultaneously across multiple participants – manufacturers, wholesalers, retailers and even patients, giving all parties a clear view of the drug’s origin and journey. In such a transparent system, any attempt to infiltrate the supply chain with counterfeit products is likely to be quickly detected.
• Immutable traceability: The core strength of the blockchain is its immutable nature – once data is written onto the blockchain, it is resistant to modification or deletion. This feature facilitates real-time tracking and tracing of each drug unit, allowing stakeholders to detect irregularities or discrepancies immediately. Any deviation in the drug’s journey becomes a conspicuous indicator of potentially adulterated intrusion.
• Robust Security: The underlying strength of blockchain lies in its sophisticated cryptographic protocols. Each transaction, or ‘block’, is intricately linked to the previous one, forming an unbroken chain. Any attempt to tamper with a transaction disrupts the chain’s continuity, triggering an immediate system-wide alert. This level of security makes it extremely challenging for counterfeiters to manipulate the data, ensuring the authenticity of the substance.

Thus, by providing an unassailable view of the pharmaceutical supply chain, blockchain technology can effectively protect against the infiltration of counterfeit drugs. It offers the prospect of a future where the authenticity of medicines that reach consumers is guaranteed, and marks a significant step forward in the fight against drug counterfeiting.

“When the promise of technological advancement meets the power of the blockchain, the result is not just progress – it is a revolution. A revolution that ensures health for all Nigerians, breaking the barriers of distance, affordability and authenticity,” Obi added.

In Nigeria, NAFDAC has a plan

Earlier this year in Nigeria, the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) said it will confront the menace of substandard and counterfeit drugs in the country with the implementation of a pharmaceutical traceability strategy.

According to Obi, NAFDAC’s push for serialization and traceability, driven by the need to protect public health and the economy from the scourge of counterfeit drugs, could be a major catalyst in the adoption of advanced digital technologies in the pharmaceutical supply chain.

“By requiring end-to-end serialization and traceability, NAFDAC addresses this dual crisis head-on. Serialization allows each unit of a product to be uniquely identified, making it easier to detect counterfeits,” she added. “Traceability ensures that a product’s journey through the supply chain can be tracked and verified, making product diversion more difficult. The potential for significant fines or even jail time for non-compliance will further deter counterfeiters.”

This regulation will further drive the introduction of digital technologies such as Chekkit and Rigour+. Linda agrees: “NAFDAC’s push for serialization and traceability, driven by the urgency to protect public health and the economy from the scourge of counterfeit drugs, can be an important catalyst in the adoption of advanced digital technologies in the pharmaceutical supply chain.”