Cabinet on Tuesday gave its no-objection to $1.2B in drugs for the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation.
Head of the Presidential Secretariat, Dr Roger Luncheon yesterday announced the contracts which are shown in the table below.
Luncheon had announced last July that only the New GPC had been prequalified to supply drugs to the public health sector for the period 2014-2016. This led to formal protests by Trinidad-based conglomerate ANSA McAL and a court challenge of the decision by the International Pharmaceutical Agency (IPA) which said that the decision was unconstitutional.
Then in October, Luncheon acknowledged that official documentation was not sent to the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB) informing it of Cabinet’s no-objection to the selection, while the Health Ministry went on record during the same month about being in the dark as to who had been prequalified as it had not received correspondence from the NPTAB.
The Ministry of Health subsequently broke its silence saying that all bidders who did not prequalify to supply drugs to the health sector for 2014 to 2016 had been formally notified and letters were provided to substantiate the claims.
This newspaper understands that the drugs now being procured had been invoiced earlier this year and bids for the project were submitted in March of this year for analysis.
The GPHC is expected to soon receive the much needed medical supplies and drugs.
