Lack of medicine or lack of responsibility?

It is now July 2024, but the problem of medicine and material shortages is still being raised - Photo: TU TRUNG

The entire hospital only has 3 CT scanners because 2 are broken and will take 2 months to fix. Even because of the lack of beds, the hospital director had to ask for them and the result was uneven beds, some high, some low...

But the paradox is that this hospital does not lack money, it has up to 1,300 billion VND for "career development" and this money cannot be deposited in the bank to earn interest but must be kept in a safe, but if it wants to buy things, the old regulations "tie it up", it cannot buy.

Now after Decree 24 and then the guiding circular, the hospital is buying, but it will take until 2025 to have enough machines to use for patients, without having to divide shifts.

Such machines, medicines, and medical supplies are no better, there are enough decrees and circulars, but is there any reason why patients and their families have to buy supplies that cost 90,000 VND, and have to buy and ask how much is enough for fear of having to exchange them?

But looking back, from March 2024, right after Decree 24 guiding the implementation of the Law on Bidding was issued, at the Conference of the Northern Regional Hospital Directors Club held in Quang Ninh, the representative of the Ministry of Planning and Investment at that time said that there was enough legal corridor for procurement bidding.

Even the points that are considered bottlenecks and make it difficult for hospitals, such as purchasing exclusive items or items with multiple prices, have been given instructions to handle. Lawmakers seem to have "heard" the specific problems of the medical field and have a direction to handle them.

And the Ministry of Health "quickly" invited members of the editorial team of the Law on Bidding to work at the ministry to handle bidding problems.

However, now in July 2024, the problem of medicine and material shortages is still being raised, even though people call it a "local" shortage. But whether it is a "local" or a total shortage, the reality is that medicine and material shortages are still happening in many places.

In some places, the hospital failed the bidding because the bid was too low and had to start over. In other places, they had to wait for new bidding regulations (which were issued at the end of February and the end of April)...

But one thing is certain: the current shortages are not due to legal reasons, because documents and policies to purchase medicine and supplies for hospitals have been available for a long time.

This shortage has been pointed out by experts as being due to the fact that hospitals have not yet thoroughly researched and applied new regulations that already exist to handle specific points in bidding for medical goods, and also because hospitals do not dare to do it, still worried about responsibility.

In that context, the question is why are there hospitals that can solve the problem of lack of medicine and medical supplies?

It can only be because they have the "hard work" to research and apply the law to life, it can only be because they put themselves in the position of the patient with the desire to provide the most complete medical services.

On July 18, the Ministry of Health sent a document to provinces and cities, once again emphasizing the factor that "the head must be responsible if there is a shortage of medicine and medical supplies". In fact, medicine and medical supplies have been in short supply since the end of 2022, for more than 2 years now.

The hospital director's concerns about the impracticability of regulations and difficulties in purchasing have been "resolved", and if there is anything that needs to be resolved, more recommendations can be made, but the shortage of medicine and medical supplies has not been completely resolved, the shortage is still there.

Hospital directors, now is the time to do it for the patients, for the quality of service, because in the market for drugs and supplies, private hospitals have them but public hospitals cannot buy them, that is the weakness of... the director. Now the Ministry of Health has said it straight, the director's job is to do it, stop complaining!

Source: https://tuoitre.vn/thieu-thuoc-hay-thieu-trach-nhiem-20240719095159091.htm