Pharmaceutical Marketing Compliance: A Plain-Language SAHPRA Primer
What pharmaceutical marketers can and cannot say to South African consumers, and how that shapes creative.
Compliance · 2026-05-11 · 9 min read
In short
SAHPRA and the Medicines and Related Substances Act govern how medicines are advertised in South Africa. Schedule 0 medicines may be advertised to the public; most scheduled medicines may only be promoted to healthcare professionals. All claims must be consistent with the approved package insert.
- Consumer advertising is limited to Schedule 0 and defined Schedule 1 products.
- Claims must not exceed the registered indications in the package insert.
- Healthcare professional communication has separate, less restrictive rules.
- The ARB Code applies on top of medicines regulation for all consumer claims.
Know your schedule
The advertising rules follow the scheduling status of the product. Getting this wrong is the most common and most expensive compliance failure in South African healthcare marketing, because remediation usually means pulling an entire flight.
Claims discipline
If it is not in the package insert, it cannot appear in the advert. Comparative claims require substantiation, and testimonials implying therapeutic outcome are effectively unusable for medicines.
How this shapes screen creative
Compliant creative on a waiting room screen tends to lead with a symptom, a category and a brand, not a clinical claim. Mandatory copy must remain legible at viewing distance, which in practice means fewer words and a larger minimum type size than print.
Frequently asked questions
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