Caribbean Medical Supplies Inc (CMSI) yesterday denied allegations that it has supplied expired HIV test kits to the Ministry of Public Health (MoPH) though Country Manager Devendra Rampersaud acknowledged being charged in court.
“We were served with a document from the [Government Analyst-Food and Drug Department] …went to court last week,” Rampersaud told Stabroek News when contacted.
“About 80 percent of the stuff that is circulating is far from the truth. The truth was manipulated. This matter stems from since 2015 and we have been working with the Ministry [of Public Health] to provide them with the documents they need. We have all the supporting documentation,” Rampersaud told Stabroek News yesterday.
He said that his company will today issue a statement to explain the matter but he wants to make clear that, “No, we did not deliver any expired goods.”
Rampersaud added that he did not want to go into detail until he had spoken to both the MoPH and the GA-FDD.
This newspaper tried contacting Minister of Public Health Volda Lawrence and the ministry’s Public Relations Officer Terrence Esseboom but calls to both their mobile numbers went unanswered.
The allegations are that Caribbean Medical Supplies Inc, sometime last year, supplied to the MoPH, 400 HIV test kits, under the Uni-Gold brand, with misleading representation and that they had expired.
Counterfeit
On the 31st of January this year, Michael Roche, Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Trinity Biotech, the company which manufactures the kits and which is based in Ireland, wrote to Lawrence expressing concern.
“It is with great concern that Trinity Biotech brings to your attention that counterfeit Uni-Gold HIV kits have been supplied to you, the MOPH of Guyana during January 2020,” said the letter, a copy of which was seen by this newspaper.
Roche provided photos as evidence of the expired items supplied, and he pointed out that not only are they counterfeit supplies from an unauthorised distributor, but they are all expired.
“The conclusions to draw from this evidence are: the Uni-Gold HIV kit box has been recreated without authorisation from Trinity Biotech and the components within repack-ed. The kit box expiry date for these 400 kits has been altered illegally. It has been extended by 17 months beyond its actual true expiry date. The product supplied by Caribbean Medical Supplies Inc to you was already 6 months out of date when you received it. The product supplied to you no longer [have] a product guarantee from Trinity Biotech since the kits have expired,” the letter stated.
Roche informed the minister that the company, on the said day of sending the correspondence, also wrote to the WHO and to the company which had originally and legitimately purchased batches of the kit with the same number.
He warned that the kits posed a risk to patient health and urged that they be immediately removed from testing centres.
Roche highlighted that it was not the first time he was writing her ministry to let them know that CMSI were not authorised to distribute their products or is any way affiliated with their exclusive distributor; the Trinidadian firm Transcontinental Medical Products Limited. “I would like to reiterate to you now, our authorised exclusive distributor for Guyana is Transcontinental Medical Products Ltd,” Roche said.
It is unclear what action the minister took but two weeks later, on 14th February this year, Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Health Collette Adams wrote to Rampersaud.
Rampersaud told this newspaper yesterday that he indeed received the correspondence and has been working with the ministry.
Under the heading, Investigation of Falsified Uni-Gold HIV Test Kits, Adams reminded Rampersaud that she had previously asked him to provide the ministry with the shipping document for the delivered kits but he had yet to do so.
She informed that the ministry was carrying out an investigation into allegations received that the company had supplied expired or tampered HIV Uni-Gold test kits to the ministry. “As such the Ministry has taken a decision to cease all delivery of drugs that was or are to be supplied to the Ministry with immediate effect,” Adams wrote.
Asked about the letter and the cease order, Rampersaud said, “We have been working with the ministry to provide them with the documents they need. We have all the documentation and have provided.”
“We have supplied products, not drugs,” he added.
Defending his company, Rampersaud said that CMSI is the authorised distributor of over 500 products and has a stellar record.
He said that the company won the bid to supply the kits back in 2015 but could not do so at the time for a number of reasons, although he did not go into detail to say what they were.
“We had made several attempts to deliver the items there. The ministry had changed its algorithms and didn’t want its products at that time. It is a lot but I will make a statement tomorrow,” he said.
