Antimalarial quality monitor in Yunnan province

Objective To understand the quality situation of antimalarial drugs in Yunnan prov ince.Methods The German Pharma Health Fund Mini-lab testing procedures and the techniques were used to screen for quality of samples at the sentinel sites.This tests include physical/visual examinations simple disinteg ration,and Thin-layer chromatography;The latest analytical methods and procedures of China Pharmacopoeia were used in this monitoring project for the verification and confirmatory testing at National Laboratories and Reference Laboratories.The tests included visual inspection obser vations,identification and content of each activeingredient(e.g.color imetic,Thin-layer chromatogr aphy,or HPLC).Results In the sentinel sites,total 6 varieties of 128 antimalar ial drug samples were collected from Ruli and Mengla counties,69 samples from Ruli and 59 sampls from Mengla.Four doubtful samples and 3 failing samples were found in the sentinel sites testing,while the pass sample rate was 94.5%,the doubtful samples made up 3.1% and 2.3% of failed samples;30 samples were sent out to SDA for verification test,and results showed that there were 7 samples which did not pass the verification test,and 76.7% samples passed.Conclusion Most antimalarial drug samples are good in quality,although some sub-standard samples are found in the sentinel sites.Continuous monitor on antimalarial drugs is necessary in Yunnan province.