Gov’t had no role in leasing NEW GPC warehouse for USAID

…site was chosen after highly technical study – Dr Ramsammy

The NEW GPC warehouse at Farm, East Bank Demerara which is rented by USAID on behalf of the Ministry of Health

Former Health Minister Dr Leslie Ramsammy said that government had no role in the selection of the NEW GPC INC warehouse by the United States government to store medical drugs on behalf of the Health Ministry. His comments come in wake of allegations by the Kaieteur News, trying to link the deal as some favour shown to the owner of the pharmaceutical company by the administration.
Dr Ramsammy, who was the health minister at the time when the contracts were issued, on Wednesday shed more light on the matter, further exposing the vindictive and scandalous report of Kaieteur News (KN). He stated that the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) technical team was assembled to determine if there was suitable space in Guyana. It consisted of personnel from the U.S. and mainly from a contracted company identified as Supply Chain Management System (SCMS).
The team visited several sites in the country after advertisements were made public and many businesses from the private sector offered their facilities to be utilised as sites for storage of medicines. Even the Guyana National Printers Limited and the People’s Progressive Party’s (PPP) Mirror newspaper plant were being offered as possible storage sites.
“The study team concluded that there was only one site in Guyana that met the U.S. requirements for storage of medicines and commodities, including test kits that they were going to be procured. The site had to meet specific requirements such as air conditioning spaces, a separate narcotic room and more. It was determined that the only site which fit the requirements was the NEW GPC,” Dr Ramsammy said.
He noted that a document was also produced by the team describing each site and included the advantages and disadvantages of every site. The former health minister reiterated that the decision to award the contract to the NEW GPC was not left to the government through the Health Ministry, but it was the U.S. which selected the pharmaceutical company. “The Health Ministry at that time had no role in the selection of the site, the determination of rental costs. The ministry had no role in negotiating the contract(s) and we were not engaged in any negotiation. The selection was done by the SCMS.”

A lie
Dr Ramsammy emphasised that it would be a blatant lie to say that the said ministry rented that space from the NEW GPC. Further, he said the space being rented through USAID and the space that was provided for free to the Health Ministry and Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC) were not the same. “This space does not co-mingle with either the space rented by SCMS or the space utilised by the NEW GPC for their own products. The space they (NEW GPC) allow us to use for free at the bond in Ruimveldt is space that we don’t rent, but is exclusively utilised by us. We have the keys and we store all our products there,” Dr Ramsammy, who is now agriculture minister, said.  According to him, this is where the confusion often lies, as it relates to claims that the NEW GPC has failed to deliver medicine. He further stated that the company delivers medicine to both the Health Ministry and the GPHC. The ministry and hospital take ownership of the medicines and keep it in the space being rented by the U.S., Dr Ramsammy said.
He posited that without the assistance and contribution of the NEW GPC, much development surrounding medicine storage would not have been achieved.
“We have transformed the storage of medicine in Guyana and could not have done so if the NEW GPC did not provide us with the space to store these medicines. The generosity of the company has also allowed us to have space for free storage as well. This has given us the opportunity to store our medicines to our whims and fancies”.
On Tuesday, NEW GPC in a statement had clarified that in July 2006; USAID funded SCMS, a PEPFAR partner, leased a building in its complex through an organisation called Management Sciences for Health (MSH). SCMS objective in Guyana is to work with the Health Ministry to strengthen various health programmes and their work is also connected to HIV/AIDS. That building comprised of offices, a small testing laboratory and various storage units and was used by SCMS to execute its own programme.
“As far as we are aware, anti-retrovirals (ARVs) and other pharmaceuticals were indeed stored there, but given the entire facility was a mere 11,000 square feet, this could not be used and was not used to store MoH and GPHC combined inventory,” NEW GPC said. Moreover, given that this facility was rented to SCMS, it could not be simultaneously used by NEW GPC.