Annual meeting of Directors of Pharmacy and Medicines and Directors of Pharmaceutical Regulatory Agencies from French-speaking sub-Saharan Africa

Four signatory states of the Lomé Initiative (Congo-B, Niger, Senegal, Togo) and one candidate country (DRC) are among them.

The aim was to improve coordination with senior officials and the various public and private players involved in the fight against counterfeit medicines in Africa. The two-day meeting focused on three central themes:

- Harmonisation of regulations at the sub-regional and continental level with recent developments in West Africa (WAEMU) and Central Africa (CEMAC);

- The creation of the African Medicines Agency (AAM), its progress and impact on national and regional agencies;

- The fight against falsified and substandard medicines (FSM).

Brazzaville Foundation took advantage of the presence of the directors of the Republic of Congo, Niger, Senegal and Togo to prepare an information pack for the Ministers of Health, which included the following elements:

- Cover letter from the Minister of Health of Togo, Political Coordinator of the Lomé Initiative;

- Report on the high-level roundtable organised on May 25, 2021 in parallel with the World Health Assembly;

- Brochure presenting the Lomé Initiative ;

- A country-by-country summary of signatures and ratifications of international treaties;

- A country note on legislative auditing.

The Chief Executive Brazzaville Foundation website was in charge of the closing session. On behalf of Togo's Minister of Health, Dr Bernardin Nyansa, Togo's Director of Pharmacy, invited participants to meet again in Lomé in April 2023.

*Founded more than 130 years ago, LEEM today has nearly 270 member companies, which account for almost 98% of total pharmaceutical sales in France. The pharmaceutical industry employs 100,000 people in over 150 professions, and has been recruiting 10,000 people a year for the past 10 years. LEEM's role is to facilitate exchanges between its members, defend their collective interests and strengthen ties with other healthcare professions. One of LEEM's missions is to draw up and enforce ethical standards for professional practices in the pharmaceutical industry. LEEM ensures that the profession's ethical rules are respected, and that pharmaceutical companies comply with the provisions of codes of good conduct.