Powder to the people — touring the home of SA’s favourite self-medication remedies

The cavernous warehouse where stakeholders and members of the media were received looked like a Makro warehouse on steroids. Rows and rows of boxes stacked on metal shelves stretched further than my eyes could see. 

“Chance takers are accident makers,” the safety posters warned. Nobody looked in the mood to test that theory. 

Before the tour began, I was buttoned into a labcoat, special boots, hairnet and gloves. Men with beards, even a hint of stubble, were handed beard nets that made them look like backup dancers in a surgical theatre. Here, hygiene was non-negotiable. 

Inside Haleon’s labs white fluorescent lights bounced off the glass walls, making the space look like a scene from a sci-fi movie. You could see everyone and everyone could see you. I could understand how you’d lose track of time here with no windows or natural light. 

The familiar in the fluorescent 

This manufacturing site in Epping is where some of our country’s most recognisable self-medication brands are made: Calpol, Centrum, Grand-Pa, Med-Lemon, Eno. 

The World Health Organization describes self-medication as the use of products by consumers to treat self-recognised conditions, or the continued use of previously prescribed medication. In South Africa, that definition looks a lot like a garage stop for Med-Lemon or a spaza shop run for Grand-Pa powder. 

Read more: InsideTheBox: Essential medicines — balancing cost, effectiveness and access in healthcare systems

I used to fake headaches just so that my mother would give me Calpol. The delicious strawberry flavour was my motivation, but hers was one of trusting the brand. South Africans are brand-loyal people. We use familiar pills, powders and sachets like family recipes. 

Hospital pharmacist Constance Chihururu’s research on pharmaceutical buying habits in South Africa backs this up. Past experience, she found, was a big driver of purchase. People overwhelmingly chose products they have used before and were even willing to pay more for them. Positive past experiences build trust and brand loyalty, and lowers perceived risk, while also driving word-of-mouth recommendations. 

Farhan Haroon, Haleon South Africa’s general manager, framed it as a matter of reach. “By producing locally and exporting across Africa, we are making our superior brands more accessible while supporting regional health priorities,” he said. The factory serves local shelves and feeds into 13 other export markets, mostly across Africa. 

Powder, pills and packets

Grand-Pa, as Haroon called it, is “the grandpa of the country”. The company’s goal for this year is to produce 1 billion doses at a current rate of 1,000 sachets per minute. He mentioned that they were working on back and period pain products under Grand-Pa, which will “hopefully be released soon”. 

Eno is the well-travelled cousin, exported as far as Canada, Portugal and Spain. The ingredients are the same as the products sold here, with packaging tweaked for international markets. Our tour guide, Haleon production manager Yassien Suleman, joked that Eno is a seasonal product, with sales peaking in December and January when South Africans tend to overindulge in holiday meals. 

The factory also produces about 4 million bottles of Calpol a year and has the largest market share in kids’ sections, said Suleman. 

A R500-million upgrade  

Haleon’s Cape Town facility is being expanded with a R500-million investment to boost production and exports. Its new vertical factory will churn out 1,200 sachets a minute, Suleman said, while saving space and energy. 

Read more: We are ready to make innovative medicines in South Africa for Africa and beyond

The company is also aiming to achieve net zero by 2030. Alongside capacity growth, Haleon is preparing to expand its Centrum range and begin exporting beyond sub-Saharan Africa by 2027. 

The economics of everyday care

According to Janine Fredericks, deputy director of the Department of Trade Industry and Competition’s InvestSA, Africa produces only 3% of the world’s medicine. She said that the government wants the country to produce more locally in order to create jobs and bring down prices. 

Read more: How local pharmaceutical production can transform Africa’s healthcare landscape from vulnerability to strength

Self-medication products are one way to fill that gap. They ease pressure on overburdened health systems, particularly in countries where queuing at clinics could last all day. 

Haleon’s strategic programme lead, Emile Locke, cited Economist Impact’s latest Health Inclusivity Index, which found that across sub-Saharan Africa, self-care medication saves healthcare systems R17.6-billion a year, frees up 7 million physician hours and hands people back 141 million hours of their time. 

The transition back into the Cape Town sun from the sci-fi glow of the labs was jarring. The factory floor had been neat, efficient, almost alien. Yet the products stacked inside were a familiar comfort to me. 

Calpol meant strawberry comfort on a sick day. Grand-Pa meant a quick fix hangover cure. Med-Lemon made the flu more bearable. This is the strange duality of self-medication. In labs, it is measured, weighed, sealed and stacked with precision. Outside, it is the gap-filler, the stand-in for care not everyone can access. DM