Africa-Press – Eswatini. The shortage of medical supplies and drugs in the country’s public hospitals will soon be a thing of the past.
This is because the ministry of health was on Thursday given the authority to commit public funds towards purchasing drugs and medicines, which are in short supply.
Minister of Health Lizzie Nkosi said; “We have just received today (June 22) the authority to commit government funds. We are working as fast as we can to put medicines on shelves,” Nkosi said.
She said the first quarter was always challenging as they had to wind up the previous year’s budget, pay off outstanding bills, produce new procurement plans, and start on the long procurement processes.
“The budget release for the quarter followed by the authority to commit government funds are the critical paths to unlock the process.
We are placing some orders of the most needed items, while we follow the rest of the process. We will have some medicines soon,” the minister said.
Meanwhile, this comes after the country’s public hospitals were marred by a serious shortage of medication and drugs, which has had a major impact on patients in the country.
Many patients had been turned away from hospitals because the drugs they needed were unavailable, but instead they were given prescriptions to source the medication from pharmacies using their own funds, which becomes a bit strenuous as a majority did not have money.
The impact of the medical drugs shortage was seen in the death of three people who died due to lack of insulin.
Insulin has been in short supply in the country since October, 2022. Currently some people on insulin, who are living with diabetes, are forced to part with E1 500 to get Actraphane, which comes in pen-injections.
Of late, injured patients at the Mbabane Government Hospital have been propelled to bring their own gauze bandages, given the shortage of medical drugs and other medical supplies in hospitals.
It is not clear as to why exactly the drugs disappeared.
However, allegations doing the rounds suggested that they were being sold in the black market.
This has resulted in the Auditor General (AG) Timothy Matsebula instituting a probe into irregularities relating to the procurement, in particular the acquisition and distribution of medicines to public institutions.
It is worth noting, however, that government has increased its spending on the ministry of health in an effort to alleviate the shortages, however, it remains to be seen if this will be enough to remedy the situation.
In addition, the ministry has also placed a request for proposal (RFP) for a new drugs distributor.
This RFP is intended to help find a more reliable and efficient way to distribute drugs in the country.
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