GPHC board to address supposed drug shortage

Dec 14, 2020 News

The new board members at the GPHC boardroom last week: From left to right- Mr. Harryram Parmessar, Malcolm Watkins, Dr. Amarnauth Dukhi, Dr. Madan Rambarran, Dr. Fawcett Jeffrey and Brigadier (ret’d) George Lewis.

Kaieteur News – The newly appointed board of the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC) will be addressing the shortage of certain medications at the facility. The Minister of Health Dr. Frank Anthony made this disclosure last week while presenting his daily update on the novel coronavirus (COVID-19).
According to the Minister, the government is “working overtime” to have the medication shortage fixed and they are currently trying to source them.
He further added that the hospital and its Board will have to take “immediate measures” to have the medication shortage sorted.
Notably, the government recently spent $3 billion to replenish the national drug supply and that allocation catered to replacing expired drugs amounting to almost $1 billion and replacing those that were out of stock.
In light of this, concerns were raised by a public health official contacted by Kaieteur News, about why the facility was still facing a drug shortage in light of the replenishing of Guyana’s drug supply. Additionally, the official – who requested anonymity – further sought to question whether it was the responsibility of the GPHC to report their medication shortage so that the drugs could have been supplied when the government purchased new medication and they failed to, or if the government was responsible for querying the drug shortage and account for the GPHC’s shortage of medication and that was not done.
Efforts were made to pose these concerns to the Health Minister for clarification last evening but attempts made to contact him were futile.
This publication understands that the replenished drugs that were both expired and out of stock were being kept in the Health Ministry’s Materials Management Units (MMUs). The Ministry source told Kaieteur News that often when there are reports of shortages in medication, it is usually a cosmetic front to have new medication procured in false emergency arrangements that saw individuals acquiring large sums of money for the procurement. The source offered the example of reports of insulin shortage for diabetic patients which they said are often untrue.

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