Health Professions Authority (HPA) Zimbabwe has urged people to get vaccinated at authorised healthcare institutions to avoid incorrect results which put their lives in danger.
This comes as some pharmacies in Harare are selling substandard Covid-19 test kits not approved for use and putting lives of the public at risk if positive cases are reported as negative.
HPA public relations manager Ms Tariro Manamike said they were concerned with the health of the public and encouraged people to get tested at registered healthcare facilities.
“It is absolutely worrying because we have got our Covid-19 cases going up as a country and we have got to bring this down,” she said. “We are still in lockdown and many businesses and people have been affected by this so it is not good for the country at all.
“We have forwarded our findings to the Ministry of Health and Child Care so that they can give us a report and we will be able to go on the ground and deal with this matter in an appropriate way. We definitely discourage people who are ripping off members of the public by using unauthorized test kits.” Ms Manamike said they were worried over the sale of unapproved Covid-19 testing kits that were likely to produce wrong results.
“We have got a list of test kits that are authorised and we encourage the public to make sure that they get tested at registered facilities because you are absolutely assured that the test kits that they are using are registered by the Ministry of Health and Child Care and the results are reliable,” she said.
“When we say registered health facilities we are talking about the hospitals and clinics that have been advertised by the Ministry of Health and Child Care.”
Last week, the Ministry of Health and Child Care, HPA and Medical Laboratories and Clinical Scientists Council conducted a multi stakeholder inspection of pharmacies where they established that some pharmacies were selling Covid-19 test kits that were not permitted in the country.