Citi Breakfast Show<\/strong> insisted that the Ministry has the medicine in stock.<\/p>\n\u201cAs I speak to you, we have enough. USAID has contracted a private company to also do some distribution so that most facilities across the country will have medication,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
He attributed the agitations from the patients to the Ministry\u2019s decision to reduce their ration from two to three months to two weeks to one month.<\/p>\n
The Health Ministry\u2019s PRO explained that \u201cin the past, we were giving two to three months stock to the various facilities or service delivery point but we decided to give two weeks to one month to the various facilities and that is what caused some of those agitations. We got information that they were not happy with the number we gave them.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to him, the Ministry took that decision because, \u201call over the world, HIV drugs do not go to the service delivery areas. They don\u2019t give three or two months but in Ghana because we have transportation issues and our supply chain system is not that effective\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t want them to come to Accra for the medication. We want to go to them so that it will be swift and quick for them,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Medical Stores fire to blame<\/strong><\/p>\nTony Goodman admitted that the destruction of the Tema Central Medical Stores destroyed millions of medical supplies including Antiretroviral drugs and that led to the shortage of the medicine.<\/p>\n
But he quickly added that the Ministry presently has enough stock which has been distributed to the various hospitals and service delivery points.<\/p>\n
He said after the fire, the government released an amount of GHC 25 million to procure medication and \u201cwe are taking delivery of enough medication\u201d for onward distribution.<\/p>\n
Goodman mentioned that his outfit is yet to take full delivery of the consignment they requested but \u201cthey are coming in bits and we don\u2019t want to run out of stock\u2026and we are also procuring some locally.\u201d<\/p>\n
ARV can\u2019t be procured locally<\/strong><\/p>\nThe Health Ministry indicated that although some local pharmaceutical companies are producing the ARV, government cannot purchase the medicine from them.<\/p>\n
He explained that the funding used to procure Antiretroviral is a global fund money \u201cand if you are using global fund money to procure medication, wherever you are procuring from should be WHO pre-qualified institution.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIn Ghana, we don\u2019t have one but we are using our local resources to procure locally \u2013 so that is in the offing,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
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By: Efua Idan Osam\/citifmonline.com\/Ghana
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