By: Nyima Sillah
Dr. Musa Marena, Obstetrician and Gynaecologist at Edward Francis Small Teaching Hospital has disclosed that the Ministry of Health’s suspension is not a total suspension of paracetamol, it is the paracetamol syrup that is suspended.
In an interview with The Voice a few weeks after the suspension, Dr. Marena said: it “is not a total suspension on the paracetamol, it is the syrup, the liquid one that is where the suspension is. For the time being until they find out what the problem is, the advice is for people to try and avoid taking paracetamol syrup or giving paracetamol syrup to their kids.”
He also said the suspension is meant to try to avoid more children from having Acute Kidney Injury (AKI). “I am sure the people who are investigating the problem were able to narrow it down to a few things which include paracetamol syrup.
“This is important so that if paracetamol syrup is the cause of the problem then there won’t be more cases coming up. This is a case where those who have it are most likely to die so they don’t want more children to die,” he added.
He noted that this is usually the procedure that happens in all countries, when an incident happens they try to find out what is the cause or the possible solutions.
He disclosed that they were able to give an alternative and that alternative is the paracetamol tablets which are usually crossed to make into syrup.
He, therefore, advised mothers who have children to adhere to what the government says. “They should avoid giving paracetamol syrup to their babies. If the babies have any fever or high temperature they should take them to the nearest health center to be given appropriate medication.
“This will include the already prepared paracetamol tablet syrup which is a paracetamol tablet which will be made into syrup and be given to them,” he said.
He went further to advice the general public to stop going to the pharmacy to buy medicines without being given a prescription. “Let’s go to the hospital for it to be prescribed to us if it is not available in the health center we can go and buy it.