The retail Sector has been placed at the centre of policy debates regarding its role in programs aimed at controlling malaria in Africa. This article is, therefore, a close examination of the managers and owners’ perspectives of drug shops and retail pharmacies in Dar es Salaam. The article presents a case for involving managers and pharmacy owners in active decision making processes that surrounds the implementation of guidelines in new treatment and training programs, which have affected their social responsibilities, their businesses, and the general health of the community. In consideration of these regulatory interventions, health planners ought to address concerns explicitly to ensure that an important role in the nation’s health system is played by retail pharmacies and that the global pharmaceutical market, which is driven by a global nexus, often directs and guides their operations and processes at local levels. The malaria control domain has been of special interest due to various reports emanating as a result of home treatment of the malaria ailment through irrelevant dosages which are bought over the counter (Nyato & Kamat, 2010).
-
0
Preparing Orders
-
0
Active Writers
-
0%
Positive Feedback
-
0
Support Agents
Through this article and other policy decisions, the drugs shop managers and pharmacists in Africa are portrayed as personnel who are unqualified and, thus, flout health regulations through the illegal sale of stock prescription drugs in dosages that are sub-therapeutic. In order to protect the interests of the wider community in Africa, it is argued that African Pharmacists retailing drugs should be regulated and trained. There are plans in the Tanzanian country to accredit and subsidize the supply of anti-malarials to ensure that retailers can only be able to dispense or sell dosages and treatments which are only recommended. There are also plans to upgrade or discontinue many of the shops selling small drugs and introduce combination therapies of fixed dose artemisinin via retail pharmacies or outlets.
“Take Back Medical Education…” by McKenna Brian
This article is concerned about an ethnographical case study that was conducted by the MichiganStateUniversity and its 3 surrounding communities in six years from 1992 up to 1998. The name of the project was known as “The Community/University Health partnership”or C/UHP and its goals were to transform the health profession through education in order to have more community-oriented practitioners in Primary care. The role of the community in the life of the project was given utter consideration. This article further reflects significant instances of counter-hegemony and hegemony between the communities and the medical schools in the doomed project. Just like in the ancient Greece, this article predicts that indeed, there will be two types of doctors, namely free doctors and slave doctors, and, thus, it will be upon the reader to choose the doctor that he or she wants. According to this article, slave doctors refer to those ones who dutifully marched according to the orders of bureaucrats and bean counters that practice “cookbook medicine” and see forty patients every day. On the other hand, the article defines free doctors as those ones who placed humanity both at the center and the front.
McKenna asserts that 4 out of 5 medical students sometimes witness incidences of unethical practices among their colleagues but yet become afraid to challenge their friends’ behavior, which is deplored privately. A system of cultural indoctrination is a situation in which the first year students become reluctant or afraid in speaking out against the injustices, while their seniors become unwilling to hear about such. Conservative medical provision is, therefore, created trough such socialization experiences. Through the article, the readers are informed that there has not been much change in medical education since the report that was presented in 1910 to the Rockefeller Foundation by Abraham Flexner. Various movements aimed at challenging the dominance of Flexner’s work have arisen, like, for instance, the Alma Ata Movement that occurred in 1978 (McKenna, 2010).
“Health Care Needs in Crisis…” by Linda Hunt and Isabel Montemayor
According to this article by Hunt and Montemayor, the United States of America is currently experiencing a health care crisis and the number of individuals who are both underinsured and uninsured has soared steadily. Among other issues, the country is also faced with various problems like, for instance, limited competency in English language among individuals in the country, poverty, and immigration status. The article is, therefore, based on interviews which were conducted with a group of Latinos regarding their experiences in the health care system. It is through the article that the reader is informed how unequal access to health care has a great impact on the United States of America. Furthermore, the article offers some recommendations on how Latinos and other small minority or marginalized groups can use community advocacy in order to gain access to vital health services which they so much need. According to survey that was conducted by Gallup in June 2009, it was established that one out of six United States’ adults lacked coverage and this represented 17% of the total population in the country, up from 15% the previous year.
From this article, it can be ascertained that the soaring costs of medication and medical care, which is highly priced, and the shrinking health coverage are some of the urgent problems that are currently facing the United States as a country. Most low income groups and minorities are known to suffer from inability to maintain their health either through being uninsured or being underinsured. The problems are especially overwhelming for individuals who are incompetent in English language, since they become very unfamiliar with how the United States health system work or operate. From various people that the researchers talked to, it was clearly indicated that there was need to improve access of all classes of people to health information and medical care (Hunt & Montemayor, 2010).