Saudi: Health Ministry Slaps Sellers With up to SR 250,000 Fines for Breast Milk Scam
Saudi Arabia’s health ministry fined a pharmaceutical company for violating its Breast Milk Substitutes (BMS) code. The minister, Fahd al-Jalajel authorised the decision to penalise the company with fines of up to $67,000 (SAR250,000).
Two penalties were imposed on the company during the first half of the year for several violations of the law of trading BMS. Representatives of the company entered hospitals and distributed brochures about breast milk substitutes in the Eastern Province.
This was in violation of Article 5 of the law, which stipulates the prohibition of advertising and promotion of breast milk substitutes and infant food.
The law for trading breast milk substitutes in the Kingdom was issued in 2004 by a royal decree, and its executive regulations were updated in 2019 by the Minister of Health. This is in compliance with the International Code of Marketing of Breastmilk Substitutes, which Saudi Arabia signed in 1981.
The decisions and penalties were issued “due to the importance of applying the rules and monitoring the performance of the regulations and laws, which promote and protect the health of community members, especially infants, and provide them with proper nutrition through breastfeeding and appropriate complementary feeding, and not giving the opportunity to violate the regulations, whether from government, private institutions or companies, or individuals working in health institutions or private companies supplying or distributing breast milk substitutes,” the health ministry said in a statement on its official website.
