FDB Blows Alarm On Chinese Company

It has come to the notice of the Food and Drugs Board (FDB) through its Post Market Surveillance activities that *Tasly Co Ltd*, a Chinese company and its distributors are engaged in practices that pose serious treat to public health and safety.

The company and its distributors have been mounting canopies with banners, advertising treatment for various disease conditions, using unapproved medical devices to make misleading diagnosis of certain life threatening diseases and also prescription of food supplements that they claim can treat such diseases.

The medical devices being used to make these misleading diagnoses by *Tasly Co Ltd* and their distributors have not been approved by the FDB as required by Law.

*Tasly Co Ltd* registered Food Supplements with the FDB and the public should note that these Food Supplements cannot treat any medical condition – they are registered as Food Supplements.

Tasly Co Ltd is now misleading the general public that their Food Supplements can treat life threatening conditions and certain chronic diseases like *Leukemia, Cancers, Stroke, **Diabetes, arthritis, Fibroid, Spinal cord problems, Waist Pain, Asthma, Heart Diseases, Hepatitis, Infertility and Impotence* etc.

These practices of *Tasly Co Ltd* do pose serious health threat to patients who patronize their products since patients with the above-mentioned conditions can develop serious life threatening complications if they do not seek proper medical care.

This practice of *Tasly Co Ltd* violates Section 14 of the Food and Drugs Law, which states that ‘*Any person who labels, packages, sells or advertises any drug, cosmetic, medical device or household chemical in contravention of any regulation made under this law or in a manner that is false , misleading or deceptive as regards its character, constitution, value, potency, quality, composition, merits or safety commits an offence’*

Additionally Section 15 of the Food and Drugs Law, PNDCL 305 B states that ‘ *No person shall advertise any drug, cosmetics, medical device or household chemical to the general public as a treatment, preventive or cure for any of the diseases, disorders or abnormal physical states specified in Schedule 2 of the law’*, which includes Sexually Transmitted Diseases, other forms of genito-urinary diseases, AIDS, diseases connected with the human reproductive functions. The rest include Cancers, Diabetes, Epilepsy, Goitre, Heart Diseases, Hernia, Leprosy, Pneumonia, Tetanus, Tuberclosis, Smallpox and others.

Furthermore, the Food and Drugs Board wishes to bring to the attention of the general public that, this action of importing, selling and supplying medical devices without registering them with the Food and Drugs Board flouts Section 18 of the Food and Drugs Law, PNDCL 305B, which states that ‘ *No person shall manufacture, prepare, sell, supply, export or import into Ghana any drug, cosmetic, medical device or household chemical unless the article has been registered with the Food.*

Meanwhile the general public is informed that two distributors of *Tasly products*, who were engaged in misleading diagnostic procedures and treatment of patients with unapproved medical devices and food supplements under canopies at Tema Communities 1 and 9 have been arrested by the Police CID and are assisting the Police in their investigation.

The general public is being advised to patronize approved Hospitals and Clinics whenever they are ill for proper diagnosis and treatment, since the services of charlatan health practitioners pose serious health threat to public health and can only lead to serious health complications.

Additionally, the FDB wishes to assure the general public of its readiness to ensure public health and safety at all times and therefore appeals to the general public to give any information on persons suspected to be in any practice that compromises public health and safety through any of the following contacts; 0244337235, 0244337252 or 0208204968.