Drugs scarce

By REBECCA KUKU
A HOSPITAL in Port Moresby recently upgraded to a level-five Public General Hospital, does not have medicine for asthma patients or antibiotics for infants, sources have revealed.
During the launching of the Gerehu General Hospital, sources who asked that they not be identified for fear of losing their jobs, said they were concerned about the welfare of patients.
“We are sending sick babies with their parents away with prescription forms to go and buy medicines at pharmacies. (But) only those who have money are able to buy,” one said.
Another source said the Gerehu General Hospital had no supply of drugs for asthma such as Salbutamol and Aminophylline.
“There are asthma patients. If we don’t give them their supplies, they are just going to die,” the source said.
The source said the Health Department continued to downplay the actual risks involved and did not understand the hardship health officials were experiencing to cope with the medicine shortage.
But Health Secretary Pascoe Kase yesterday continued to deny that there was a medicine shortage in the country.
“The department will procure medicines using the Secretary Authority to buy medicines while awaiting the tender process to take effect,” he said.
Kase said the process was not new and that it had been done before.
”We can buy medicines from established companies that have the capacity to supply,”Kase said.
Kase advised hospital chief executive officers, officers in charge and pharmacists to inform the department two weeks in advance when the medicine supply is running out so that the stock can be replenished on time.
It is understood that the health secretary has the authority to spend about K500,000 to buy medicine while waiting for the tender process to be implemented.
Kase said the tender process could take up to five months.
Meanwhile, the Misima General Hospital has also run out of medicine and has been turning away patients.
The concern over the shortage of medicine around the country was exposed recently after it came to light that the contract for the pharmaceutical company supplying medicine to the Government had expired and no effort was made to renew it.