Govt to develop Drug Procurement Manual

In an effort to improve the management of the supply chain, government will be moving to develop a Procurement Manual for the provision of drugs and medical supplies.
Government will be seeking to have the guide available at least by the end of the third quarter of this year, according to information coming out of the Ministry of Finance’s Mid-year report.
According to the report, the procurement of drugs and medical supplies continue to be an issue of concern for Government. It stated that of the budgeted .5 billion allocated for this, only billion has been expended in the first half of the year. It is with this in mind that government will carry out the initiative.
Meanwhile, the report stated that some .8 billion of the .2 billion budgeted for the sector was expended in the first half of 2017. Of this amount, more than 95 percent were recurrent expenses. Capital expenditure at the half year was very low, the report stated, with a mere 12 percent of the .1 billion budgeted for 2017.
In an effort to improve the delivery of healthcare across the administrative regions, government said it has already completed the Service Level Agreements (SLAs) and will re-engage Regional Administrations, through the Ministry of Communities. Once enacted, service delivery quality across the country will be standardised and will set a platform for the collection and analysis of data to support evidence-based decision making in the health sector.
Government also expended some 0 million on medical evacuation (medevac) services, an increase of over 100 percent of the amount spent in 2016.
It also partnered with the Cuban Medical Brigade to deploy a total of 67 specialists to multiple regional and district hospitals in the first half of 2017, in addition to the 63 deployed in 2016. And as medical facilities continue to be upgraded, it is hoped that there will be reduced referrals to the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation.
In order to ensure that efforts are coordinated and consolidated under the umbrella of the Health Vision 2020, and to maximise efficiency gains, Government has also launched the National System of Health Accounts (SHA).
The SHA will allow for the financial linking of programme plans to a health system platform and standardising costing approach programme. SHA will also allow for projections regarding the extent of population coverage and available services and their impact on the overall health of the population.
In completing the outstanding commitment to the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) Goal 5 – Improving Maternal Health –, a targeted intervention to support improved maternal child health, which will involve an assessment of emergency neonatal and obstetric care, will commence later this year the report stated. In addition, improvements to the maternal waiting homes are expected in the second half as well.

Mental Health
According to the Ministry of Public Health, mental health issues continue to affect society and at the half year, there have been 59 reported cases of suicide. Training of health professionals on mental health is on-going, and 106 of the 300 targeted individuals have already been trained this year.
The Mental Health Institute is being renovated and is expected to be completed in the second half of the year. In addition, a sum of $312.2 million was expended at the half year of the budgeted $2 billion for the improvement and maintenance of health infrastructure across the country.