You don’t have to be a prophet to know that a disaster will soon come in the distribution of medicines for the health sector in Mexico. You just have to put the pieces together and there is no doubt: everything is ready to have a ‘perfect storm’.
In this space last week, what we consider to be a terrible government decision was mentioned, that of buying medicines abroad, especially because, first of all, the quality and efficacy of these products is not guaranteed, with the risk to health for patients; and secondly, because in Mexico there is an entire industry not only capable of supplying the sector with opportunity, but even of exporting to other latitudes.
The worst thing is that after reforming the Procurement Law, which will allow the purchase of medicines and medical supplies abroad, with the help of the United Nations (UN) and the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), the President Andrés Manuel López Obrador announced the creation of a new government distributor of medicines, vaccines and medical supplies, which will start operating in mid-August and will be headed by David León Romero, who until last week served as national coordinator of Protection Civil.
Let us remember that the consolidated purchase of medicines made last year, which was carried out by Raquel Buenrostro, at that time senior official of the Ministry of Finance and Public Credit (SHCP), and now head of the Tax Administration Service (SAT), did not go well at all. , given that it only managed to award 38 percent of the more than 3,000 keys that were tendered. Everything was wrong, because it was done out of time and the announced savings were not achieved.
It goes without saying that poor planning and execution of the consolidated purchase for this year caused the shortage of medicines that we have seen throughout the country, as in the case of oncology for children with cancer, which is so much drama and suffering have caused, which forced health institutions, such as the Mexican Institute of Social Security (IMSS) and the Social Security and Services Institute for State Workers (ISSSTE), among others, to rehire wholesalers that they had been accused of corruption by the president.
The original problem, if we are clear, is that it has not been a problem of shortages of medicines, as has been repeatedly denounced, but a matter of inefficient purchases by the government.
In this context, and in this same month of August, the new government drug distributor will come into operation, with a budget of 50 billion pesos.
Given this, it is convenient to say that David León Romero, the head of the new state drug distributor, has no experience in the pharmaceutical industry. He is a communication scientist by training, and before serving as a 4T official he was a spokesperson for the Green Ecologist Party of Mexico in the Senate of the Republic and advisor on Social Communication to Manuel Velasco, former governor of Chiapas.
The president presented him as “one of the best public servants” in this government, which we do not doubt, but that is not the point, but rather the lack of experience of this official in such a sensitive area, which demands technical knowledge and specialization, such as the distribution of drugs, vaccines and medical supplies, especially with regard to the cold chain.
As stated at the beginning of this column, the pieces on the board are set to have a disaster in the distribution of medicines, and therefore, in the access to these by patients in the health sector, because in addition to the creation of this improvised and monopolistic state distributor adds the additional complexity of importing medicines from who knows where, whose quality and effectiveness no one guarantees.
On the other hand, as we have warned, on the side of the pharmaceutical industry installed in the country, there is great uncertainty and disagreement about the changes announced by the Mexican government, especially because we are in the middle of a pandemic that has already left, until At the moment, 50 thousand deaths, which places Mexico as the third country with the most deaths from Covid-19.
Thus, the National Chamber of the Pharmaceutical Industry (Canifarma), the Mexican Association of Pharmaceutical Research Industries (AMIIF), the National Association of Drug Manufacturers (Anafam) and the Mexican Association of Pharmaceutical Laboratories (Amelaf), among others, have requested by various means to President López Obrador to support his accusations of corruption, investigate and apply the corresponding sanctions. At the same time, the industrialists clarified that they are not a monopoly sector, they affirmed that they compete with everything and always, in addition to the fact that in the country there are more than 250 pharmaceutical plants and this economic branch generates more than 600 thousand jobs, so direct and indirect.
The good news is that at the last minute the Mexican laboratories were included in the next tenders to be carried out under the supervision of the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS); However, pharmaceutical manufacturers are preparing with their lawyers for what is expected to be a tough legal battle in court, and in this way, to prevent the massive purchase of drugs from being made abroad.
In sum, there is no strategy and a clear path that defines change in the health sector. The pretext has been an alleged fight against corruption, but along the way there have been inefficient purchases, direct awards (close to 90 percent, according to Inefam), a lot of opacity, overpricing, and as a result of all this, shortages of medicines, which will be a constant in 2021.
Emergency room
According to the Mexican Pharmaceutical Institute (Inefam), about 90 percent of drug purchases in the first half of 2020 have been made through direct awards… And the much-mentioned transparency, apa?
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