Robert Tumasang
6 October 2008
The SDO for the Upper Nyong Division of the East Province, Ndongo Ndongo, has promised hard times for illegal dealers in Chinese drugs in his Division.
Ndongo Ndongo was speaking in Dimako recently during the first stop of his sub-divisional contact tour."We will dispatch a crack team of health officials, military personnel and commerce authorities to the field. They will seize the so-called Chinese drugs and burn them," the SDO said.
Ndongo Ndongo was reacting to a rather chilling report by Dr. Joseph Ndjeng, Director of the Dimako Health Centre, to the effect that the population is systematically making recourse to Chinese drugs instead of those supplied in regular hospitals."Dimako is perhaps the only town where anybody can pass for a medical doctor," Dr. Ndeng said in apparent frustration.
He said most of those selling and prescribing "these Chinese drugs don't only lack basic notions in medical practice; they don't even understand the Chinese language and curiously, the usage directives on the drugs that are written in Chinese."
"How can such a person prescribe drugs for patients?" he questioned.The medic further said that he had noticed evidence of the misuse of such drugs, noting that they constitute a serious health hazard for the population.
"These drugs are weapons of mass destruction," a young man, Fidéle Basama, screamed from the crowd as Dr. Ndjeng made this point.Basama told this reporter that he almost lost his life after a "Chinese doctor in black skin administered to me malaria medicine."
"Most of those selling these drugs are Cameroonians who pretend to have studied Chinese medicines. All this must be brought under control," the SDO fumed.Dr. Ndjeng further revealed that many people don't go to hospital because of poverty.
The meeting also served as a forum for the SDO to come to terms with the problems facing his Division, following, his appointment last August.Speaking during the meeting, Dimako Mayor, Janvier Mongui Sossoumba, complained that the population has a culture of always waiting to be supplied instead of working hard to better their lives.
"The logging company SFID used to be the source of manna for the population. It used to take care of their health needs, their food needs, their water needs, but it went out of business five years ago. Since then, the people have not noticed that the realities have changed," he said.
The SDO advised the denizens to adapt to the changing times, by investing in agriculture as a valid alternative way of making life better.
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