34th signature down: Nigeria joins Africa's shared medicines agency

Nigeria has formally ratified the African Medicines Agency treaty, becoming the 34th African Union member state to do so. The announcement came at the first African Medicines Agency Week in Kigali, Rwanda, which ended on 30 October. The agency's job is unglamorous and vital: harmonise how medicines are approved across the continent, so a good drug cleared in one country reaches patients in another faster — and so substandard and fake medicines find fewer cracks to slip through. NAFDAC chief Professor Mojisola Adeyeye called the ratification an investment in Africa's health security and in making more of its own medicines.

SDG 3 · Good health and well-being — Mechanism: policy reform