Ghana launches MeTA

Posted on 15 December 2008

Ghana launched MeTA on 12 November 2008 in Accra. Around 80 people attended including key stakeholders with an interest in MeTA such as representatives from the Ministry of Health, the World Health Organization, Ghana‟s pharmaceutical industry and civil society organisations. Several national radio, television, internet and newspaper journalists were also present to cover the event.

Key representative from the different stakeholder groups spoke about MeTA and the potential it has for change in Ghana. Each saw the relevance of a combined effort towards higher transparency and accountability in their work to make medicines accessible and safe to people in Ghana.

The Deputy Minister of Health, Hon Gladys N Ashitey spoke about the challenges facing Ghana in relation to citizens‟ access to essential medicines. Only one third of people in Ghana have access to essential medicines of high quality creating what she described as „untold hardships‟ on the population. She spoke about high levels of inefficiencies and potential fraud, along with practices such as the addition of unnecessarily high mark-ups along the supply chain as undermining the health outcomes of Ghanaian citizens. She continued to say, “Many of these issues are grounded in problems of information asymmetry in the relationships among distributors, prescribers, dispensers, and consumers. This highlights the need for policies and systems that encourage more transparent and effective communication in the process of care.”

Dr Alex Dodoo, co-chair of the MeTA Ghana Council gave the welcome address during the launch and pointed out the complexity of the situation: "The appropriate medicines have to be selected from the thousands available; then they have to be procured after involving the relevant regulatory authorities and agencies in their registration, importation or local manufacture. When they arrive in the country or at the factory gates, these medicines have to be distributed to public and private facilities including hospitals, clinics, pharmacies and licensed chemical sellers‟ shops nationwide. They then have to be priced and supplied by licensed professionals in licensed premises. Clearly, this whole process is extremely complex process and a weakness in any one of the various areas mentioned could have a
huge impact on the price and/or availability of the medicine to the consumer."

The process of establishing MeTA in Ghana is aimed at improving transparency, communication and accountability in order to meet some of these challenges.

Pauline Seenan, Deputy Director of Department for International Development, Ghana said “The Ghanaian health sector has benefited from a sector wide approach in which the Ghana National Drugs Programme made successful strides in improving the supply and use of essential medicines. But more needs to be done and to be done by different stakeholders. And that is where MeTA comes in.”

Charles Allotey, of Health Access Network, and representing a group of civil society organizations involved in MeTA Ghana said, “We believe that the problems of price, quality and availability of medicines, which are major concerns of the ordinary consumer, can be tackled by improving transparency and access to information. Because of the sensitive nature of work related to transparency, it will be important to continue to help build ownership of META from all stakeholders and partners to ensure continued commitment and the successful implementation of the project.”

Paul Lartey of the Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association of Ghana said, “PMAG is a trade association of 35 active companies that produce approximately 30 per cent of the drugs used in our country…We see MeTA as an important resource for partnering with all stakeholders in healthcare so as bring the transparency necessary to ensure that information the quality, pricing and availability of drugs is brought to the forefront.”

The commitment to working in a multi-stakeholder process to improve access to essential medicines in Ghana is strong from all sectors. However, it is clear that stakeholders are not expecting an easy task ahead of them.

In his closing remarks, the Co-chair of MeTA Ghana Council, Prof David Ofori-Adjei said, "More stakeholders working together is not as simple as it looks. Agreement will not always
work but discussion will help and that will promote progress within MeTA."