Sesame (sesamun indicum L) Market Structure in Jigawa State, Nigeria

Poor marketing structures among others have been identified to be one of the major issues limiting agricultural productivity in Nigeria. Sesame market structure in Jigawa state of Nigeria was examined by studying four sesame markets and also traders and selling agents. Two of the markets were rural (Suletankarkar and Kargo) while the other two were urban (Gumel and Maigatari).The markets were selected using a purposive random sampling. A non recurring survey was conducted in the selected markets in which 117 traders and 39 selling agents were interviewed from the list of their respective associations using a simple random sampling procedure. Questionnaires used as instrument of data collection were pre-tested. Times series data for sesame recorded for the period of 2000-2012 by Jigawa A.D.P. were also used. The data were analysed using Gini ratio analysis.  The Gini ratio for business concentration of rural selling agents and urban selling agents were 0.6013 and 0.5360 respectively. The Gini ratio for rural traders and urban traders were 0.3664 and 0.7838 respectively. The market structure analysis revealed that urban selling agents and rural traders command greater influence. The markets function with some level of imperfection. Market structure could be improved by breaking the dominance of the sesame market by few selling agents. This could take the form of making credits available to the traders and policy intervention in the form of incentives for value addition to sesame local purchasers

Meningococcus serogroup C clonal complex ST-10217 outbreak in Zamfara State, Northern Nigeria.

After the successful roll out of MenAfriVac, Nigeria has experienced sequential meningitis outbreaks attributed to meningococcus serogroup C (NmC). Zamfara State in North-western Nigeria recently was at the epicentre of the largest NmC outbreak in the 21st Century with 7,140 suspected meningitis cases and 553 deaths reported between December 2016 and May 2017. The overall attack rate was 155 per 100,000 population and children 5-14 years accounted for 47% (3,369/7,140) of suspected cases. The case fatality rate (CFR) among children 5-9 years was 10%, double that reported among adults ≥ 30 years (5%). NmC and pneumococcus accounted for 94% (172/184) and 5% (9/184) of the laboratory-confirmed cases, respectively. The sequenced NmC belonged to the ST-10217 clonal complex (CC). All serotyped pneumococci were PCV10 serotypes. The emergence of NmC ST-10217 CC outbreaks threatens the public health gains made by MenAfriVac, which calls for an urgent strategic action against meningitis outbreaks

The current situation regarding long-acting insulin analogues including biosimilars among african, Asian, European, and South American countries : findings and implications for the future

Background: Diabetes mellitus rates continue to rise, which coupled with increasing costs of associated complications has appreciably increased global expenditure in recent years. The risk of complications are enhanced by poor glycaemic control including hypoglycaemia. Long-acting insulin analogues were developed to reduce hypoglycaemia and improve adherence. Their considerably higher costs though have impacted their funding and use. Biosimilars can help reduce medicine costs. However, their introduction has been affected by a number of factors. These include the originator company dropping its price as well as promoting patented higher strength 300 IU/ml insulin glargine. There can also be concerns with different devices between the manufacturers. Objective: To assess current utilisation rates for insulins, especially long-acting insulin analogues, and the rationale for patterns seen, across multiple countries to inform strategies to enhance future utilisation of long-acting insulin analogue biosimilars to benefit all key stakeholders. Our approach: Multiple approaches including assessing the utilisation, expenditure and prices of insulins, including biosimilar insulin glargine, across multiple continents and countries. Results: There was considerable variation in the use of long-acting insulin analogues as a percentage of all insulins prescribed and dispensed across countries and continents. This ranged from limited use of long-acting insulin analogues among African countries compared to routine funding and use across Europe in view of their perceived benefits. Increasing use was also seen among Asian countries including Bangladesh and India for similar reasons. However, concerns with costs and value limited their use across Africa, Brazil and Pakistan. There was though limited use of biosimilar insulin glargine 100 IU/ml compared with other recent biosimilars especially among European countries and Korea. This was principally driven by small price differences in reality between the originator and biosimilars coupled with increasing use of the patented 300 IU/ml formulation. A number of activities were identified to enhance future biosimilar use. These included only reimbursing biosimilar long-acting insulin analogues, introducing prescribing targets and increasing competition among manufacturers including stimulating local production. Conclusions: There are concerns with the availability and use of insulin glargine biosimilars despite lower costs. This can be addressed by multiple activities