Quacks flood medical laboratories

By Steven Candia and Diana Nassali 

IT has emerged that the medical profession is riddled with people masquerading as laboratory technicians and assistants.

This was disclosed on Monday after the Allied Health Professional Council on Monday ran an advert in the media alerting the public about the danger of such people.

This, the council, said has grave consequences on the quality of laboratory results, diagnoses and treatment prescriptions.

Though the council identified a few people who are allegedly masquerading as laboratory assistants and technicians with the aid of forged council registration certificates, the number, it said, is way bigger than that.

Annet Nabbanja, the council’s legal officer, yesterday said the number of those with forged certificates is about 40, with a similar number using forged academic transcripts.

She said the Police have been alerted about the vice so that the culprits are arrested and prosecuted in court. 

The Allied Health Professional Council is a statutory body established to regulate, supervise and control the practice of medicine and handle other related matters of allied health professionals in Uganda.

Section 55 of the Allied Health Professionals Act provides that anyone who does not register with the council but continues to practice medicine or does anything to deceive patients commits an offence.

Nabbanja said most of the culprits are Senior Four leavers, who find it easy to forge the medical certificate and work as laboratory assistants and technicians despite not having undergone training. She said the culprits work in numerous health facilities, especially private clinics.

The vice, Nabbanja said, has been going on for a long time and the Police have been notified of it.

However, there has been little breakthrough in terms of arrests as the culprits flee upon sensing danger.