Caddle warns on unsafe imports, misleading medical claims

A new medical products law is expected to tighten controls on what reaches Barbados’ shelves, amid concern that items banned elsewhere have been sold here and that unproven health claims are being used to mislead consumers.

Marsha Caddle, the economic affairs and planning minister, said the Barbados Medical Products Bill, which went before the House of Assembly on Tuesday, was needed to oversee and ensure the suitability of items imported into the country.

She told the House: “We have a tradition. We have had medicines and products that have come into the normal usage of Barbadians that, within months and years, were banned in many other jurisdictions, and one day you would go to find something on the shelf, and you won’t find it; someone will say: ‘No, they stopped selling that for that purpose.’ Or, you would have another interesting encounter, which is that you would pick up a product and it would say ‘for export only’ and you would think: ‘I beg your pardon. So you’re trying to tell me that you’re not going to use this for the purpose that you intended in the place that you make it, but you’ll export it for us poor fools to consume it because it is banned in your jurisdiction, but you don’t mind if it is used by other people in other jurisdictions.’ 

“So it is important that this legislation will now start in public conversation about how we consume medication. There are certain things that you can get over the counter in Barbados that you could never find over the counter in other jurisdictions because of the level of regulation and there’s good reason for some of this.”

Caddle also said it was necessary to prevent stores from advertising products said to have healing benefits without evidence to support those claims.

“I go into Bridgetown, and I pass a sign that says that ‘Here within the precincts of this business, we cure cancer, we cure this, we cure that’. And you walk in there, and you buy things that they claim can do all of these things. And time has come, that through this legislation, that if you have not independently tested and verified that these items can do what you claim they can do, you cannot make that claim anywhere in advertising, by word of mouth, on the radio, on a Saturday afternoon.

“Barbadians who are lining up to have their medical issues addressed and who consider that they may be able to do it more economically to go and buy a piece of bush in a bag for $20 than perhaps to have to go and get an appointment or wait for an appointment to have it properly addressed. You are taking full advantage of an entire population of people that feel that they can do no better, are desperate for something to address their issue and live in a culture of home remedies.”

Caddle described as “bordering on the level of criminal” the practice of companies going on television and radio to claim their products can cure a range of ailments.

Calling it a regulatory gap that must be addressed, she urged those engaged in such practices to stop.

“That is a gap in the legislation and the regulatory regime that must be filled and I am celebrating this legislation to the extent that it is going to be able to help regulate that particular issue… I hope that those that can hear my voice that know that they are in breach of what I have just described, will not wait for the legislation to address it, but will fall back and that their conscience, if it hasn’t pricked them by now, will prick them as a result of this debate. and they will realise that they are taking advantage of Barbadians and will desist from the behaviour.” 

(JB)