Scratch & Win War Is Waged on Africa’s Fake Malaria Medicines
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At 12:30 p.m. on May 6, Ampem Dankwah sends a cell-phone message from the lobby of a downtown cafe in Accra, Ghana: “GH4F9H84B4.” His text opens a front in the war on sham malaria drugs.
Within 1.2 seconds, Dankwah’s transmission is routed to a Hewlett-Packard Co. data center in Galway, Ireland, where a computer verifies the code and responds, “OK.” It is the first test of a system developed by HP and Dankwah’s employer, mPedigree Network Ltd., to help millions of Africans avoid counterfeit malaria pills with little or no active medicine, Bloomberg Businessweek reports in its May 17 issue.