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Roundup: 17 smugglers nabbed as Nigeria clamps down on codeine

Xinhua,May 11, 2018 Adjust font size:

by Olatunji Saliu

ABUJA, May 10 (Xinhua) -- Seventeen smugglers of codeine have been nabbed in north-central Nigeria as the country begins to enforce its ban on the substance, the national anti-drug police said on Thursday.

Onah Ogilegwu, a senior official of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency in the northern state of Kwara, said the anti-drug operatives in the state had arrested 13 of the suspects with codeine and various drugs.

All 17 suspects were arrested within one week.

Ogilegwu confirmed that anti-drug operatives had seized 12 cartons of codeine from the suspects. Some of the codeine cartons were being smuggled to another northern state by the suspects.

The suspects had confessed to making money from the sale of codeine for a very long time, he said.

The Nigerian government had announced the ban on codeine a week ago, directing relevant agencies to enforce it.

The ban includes halting the issuance of permits for the importation of codeine as an active pharmaceutical ingredient for cough preparations.

Codeine is a narcotic pain-reliever and cough suppressant similar to morphine and hydrocodone.

Getting and abusing codeine is relatively easy as it is less regulated than some opiates considered to be more dangerous.

The ban on all codeine-based cough syrup came amid increased reports of the abuse of such substances in Nigeria, Africa's most populous country.

During a plenary session last week, the Nigerian Senate said its investigation revealed at least 3 million bottles of codeine-based cough syrups are consumed every day in the country, with 70 percent of them going into the enclaves of terror group Boko Haram in the northeast region.

According to a Senate leader, a few million bottles of the banned substance were found used last year in the northwestern Nigerian states of Jigawa and Kano.

The Nigerian government said cough syrups containing codeine would be replaced with dextromethorphan which is less addictive.

The dextromethorphan is a cough suppressant used to treat coughing, and also a drug of the morphinan class with sedative, dissociative, and stimulant properties. Enditem

 

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