IT seems the list of cross-border problems involving Pakistan and Afghanistan is endless, which in turn underlines the need for greater, urgent cooperation between the two neighbours.

On Thursday, there was a news item from Kabul about how Afghanistan is awash with substandard drugs that are made in Pakistan.

The report is based on information from the Independent Joint Anti-Corruption Monitoring and Evaluation Committee that brings together the Afghan government and the ‘international community’. It gives the impression that at least a proportion of these substandard medicines are exported under a legal licence whereas others are smuggled.

Also read: Smuggled medicine floods Afghan market, says report

According to the committee, up to 300 companies in Pakistan produce exclusively for Afghanistan low-quality drugs that are considered not fit to be sold in the country of their origin — which would leave many wondering just how bad ‘substandard’ is in this case.

Whereas some measures are under way to purge Pakistan of spurious and substandard medicines under the drug regulatory law of 2012, the country still has a long way to go before it can claim to be running a successful campaign towards regulating production and the sale of medicines.

To assume that the Afghan evaluation committee is talking about low-quality drugs that cannot penetrate the Pakistani market would mean taking the term ‘low quality’ to new depths.

There can be no two opinions. These drugs should not be available, not in Pakistan, not in Afghanistan. It is essential for the Pakistani authorities to heed the message from across the border and duly mark it as a problem that needs urgent attention.

All parties involved need to quicken the pace at which they are working. As Pakistan transits from a centralised authority, the provincial units have to move faster in shaping a new system to regulate drugs, towards which a case is pending in the Supreme Court.

And most basic, there needs to be some investment in the infrastructure as well as in manpower. There are currently said to be too few drug inspectors, and quite often it is an accident that leads to the discovery of the sale or consumption of a substandard drug.

The health ministry in Pakistan wants harsher penalties for those guilty of producing substandard drugs, but as a more basic deterrent it has to also improve its monitoring system. An overall improved system will greatly help in discouraging the use of Pakistani territory for the transfer of unhealthy cargo the committee in Kabul claims to have unearthed.

Published in Dawn, November 21th, 2014