The Federal Government is considering tougher legal action against the street hawking of medicines as regulators push for tighter control over where drugs are sold and how sellers are monitored.
The Director-General of the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control, NAFDAC, Professor Mojisola Adeyeye, says mobile medicine hawkers remain difficult to regulate because they move between locations, making inspection and enforcement harder.
But the proposal is not starting from zero.
A Senate bill already under consideration contains provisions targeting medicine hawking at unauthorised locations.
That still does not mean a new nationwide ban is in force.
Senate bill already at second reading
The Counterfeit Medical Products, Fake Drugs and Unwholesome Processed Foods (Prohibition and Control) Bill, 2026, listed as SB.951, has passed second reading in the Senate.
The bill includes provisions against medicine hawking at unauthorised locations and proposes tougher penalties for offences covered by the legislation.
But second reading is only one stage of the legislative process.
The bill has not been established as having completed passage through the National Assembly, received presidential assent or taken effect as law.
That distinction is central to the story.
A bill under consideration is not the same as an enforceable ban.
Why NAFDAC wants tighter control
Adeyeye says medicine hawkers create an enforcement problem because they do not operate from fixed premises that regulators can easily inspect.
NAFDAC and the Pharmacy Council of Nigeria already regulate different parts of the medicine-distribution system.
But mobile vendors are harder to trace, inspect and monitor consistently.
That can create gaps in product traceability and regulatory oversight.
Adeyeye has also indicated that legislation alone would not solve the problem without sustained enforcement.
Hawking and counterfeiting are not the same thing
The proposed restrictions come amid wider government concern about counterfeit and substandard regulated products.
But medicine hawking should not automatically be treated as counterfeiting.
A medicine sold by a street vendor is not, by that fact alone, fake or substandard.
Likewise, counterfeit products can move through channels other than street hawking.
The regulatory argument is narrower: mobile medicine sales can make oversight, traceability and enforcement more difficult.
What government still needs to explain
If the bill advances, several questions will require clear answers.
What locations and forms of medicine selling will be prohibited?
Which agencies will enforce the restrictions?
What penalties will apply, and to whom?
How will regulators distinguish unlawful hawking from other medicine-distribution channels?
And how will the policy affect communities where licensed pharmacies and formal medicine outlets are limited?
That access question matters.
Public-health regulation should reduce unsafe distribution without creating new barriers to legitimate medicines for underserved communities.
The accountability test
Government and regulators have identified medicine hawking as an enforcement problem.
The Senate is already considering legislation that addresses it.
The next test is whether the final law, if passed, clearly defines prohibited conduct, creates workable enforcement powers and protects legitimate access to medicines.
For now, the verified position is specific:
Nigeria is considering tougher legal restrictions on medicine hawking, and a Senate bill containing such provisions has passed second reading. No new nationwide ban has yet been established as law.
