By Anibeze, Chinwe Laurentia
NAI:L>AC hlte drug control campaign is a programme 01' the National
Agency Sor Food and Drug Administration and Control (NA1:DAC).
llnder this progranime, the Agency engages various campaign packages
aimed at change in behavior of drug buyers. This change in behavior
was necessitated by the proliferation of' I'akc drugs in the cou~itry.'l 'lic
programme has been ongoing since 1994. 'L'he major purpose oT this
rcscarch work tlicrefore was to deteniiinc the extent to which this
NAFIIAC programinc has been successSu1 in influencing the cl~oiceo r
drugs of consumers in the south-eastcrn states or Nigeria. 'l'hc study
adopted a descriptive survey research design. It was guidcd by six
rcscarch cluestions and three hypotheses. 'l'hc hypotheses wcrc tested at
.05 level of significance. The population of the study consisted of
26,758 sccondnry school teachers rrom the live castcrn statcs that make
up the south-castern zone of Nigeria. The sample for this study consisted
ol' 1,338 scconda~y school teachers draw11 li-om the five statcs. A
structured, 60 item clucstionnairc was uscd Sor data collcctioll. 'l'hc
validated instrument was tested for internal consistcncy reliability using
tlic Croabach Alpha. l'he reliability co-cllicicnt lbr the various sections
of' the instrument ranged between .80 and .91. l'he reliability of tlic
entire instru~iien't was 36. l'he statistical tools uscd Sor data aiialysis
wcrc the mean, standard deviation arid student t-test. The findings
among others include: that respondents agreed that secondary sciiool
tcachcrs were highly aware of NAFDAC I-cgistered drugs; they agrccd
that the NAFDAC registration number influenced their choice 01' drugs;
the I-cspoiidc~itsw crc aware that tlicrc wcrc some indigenous drug
coinpanics blacklisted by NAFDAC. It was Sound that brand loyalty and
pricc had an iniluence on-choice or drugs. It was also found that many
problems wcrc still encountered in identilying NAVDAC rcgistcrcd
drugs. There was no significant difference in the mean responses of
urban and rural secondary school teachers on the influence of NAPI>AC
control campaign on choice of drugs. tlowcver, the male and t'cmalc
secondary school teachers difkr sighificantly in their responses on tlic
influcncc or NAFDAC control campaign on choice of drugs. It was
tlicrcliw concluded that choice or drug was highly influcnccd by
NAIDAC drug control campaigns. It was recommended that the
govcrni~ient should subsidize the cost of registration of drugs by the
manuSacturers, to lower the unit price or drugs.