K.H.M.H. doctors say most supplies bought through middle man…
The sweetheart deals in the purchase of medical supplies for the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital is stinking to high heaven. When News Five opened Pandora’s Box last week on the scandalous overpricing by the politically connected De la Fuente Pharmacy in Orange Walk, that was only the tip of the iceberg. Today more startling information came from the same doctors who sounded alarm bells on the hustle at the K.H.M.H. Details were revealed at a press conference which the Belize Medical and Dental Union called this morning in Belize City.
Doctor John Sosa, President, B.M.D.U.
“There’s a list of fifty-one things there. Another company, and this company gives them ten things and this one has given them one thing. This other company; one, this other company; four, this other company one. This one again; one, this one again; one, this other; one, this one; two, this one; one, this other company; seven. What are we seeing? It seems to us that for some reason someone is getting the majority of the business and at this time I would just like to digress a little bit and give you and update on how the medications are currently—not currently but a few days ago—how they have been bought for the last ten months. One person brought in his supply officer and that one person decided and still decides what he pays for medication and who he spends it with; one person. This person is not a technical person. Prior to ten months ago, two technical persons, the Director of Medical Services and the Chief Pharmacist, they’d call around, find a supplier with the best price for the best quality and recommend that to be bought. For the past ten months that has no longer happened; it has been taken out of their hands. And they have told this to the Minister of Health, to the C.E.O. and to the Board on two occasions in our presence. If we are being believed or not, we cannot say. But we believe that these two gentlemen are telling the truth. So what are we saying? One person is deciding who he buys from and what he spends for things that the hospital does not get from Central Supplies. And we will not go into Central Supplies in detail because it is another issue but basically, the hospital has to buy around half of what it does not get from Central Supplies for whatever reason. So half of the supplies that the hospital should be getting from Central Supplies are lacking and the hospital uses its money to buy those things and they can say that we can buy from who we want at a price we want, fine. Well then, we would think that maybe they could find the best supplier or a direct supplier because we seem to have too much business going through middle men.”
According to information available, the De la Fuente family also operates another pharmacy known as Zoe Pharmacy.
