The Philippine government lost about P1 billion in public funds because of overpriced protective equipment that the budget department procured from April to May, a senator said.
Three million out of 5 million sets of personal protective equipment that the DBM bought were from Chinese companies, said Sen. Risa Hontiveros.
The PPE sets are overpriced by P200 to P500 each when compared with the Philippine General Hospital’s estimated price of P1,200 to P1,500, according to Hontiveros.
“Overpriced na nga, di pa pinapagawa sa Pilipinas. Sayang na sa pera, mukhang may kinita pa.”
[These are overpriced and not made in the Philippines. It seems somebody even made money from this procurement.]
“P1 bilyon na dapat sana ay pupunta sa mas maraming PPEs. Lalo na sa panahong ito na dumadami ang bilang ng ating health workers na namamatay dahil sa inadequate protection,” she added.
[P1 billion that could have been used to buy more PPEs, especially at a time when many of our health workers die due to inadequate protection.]
Hontiveros noted that the P1 billion lost to overpriced PPEs could have been used to increase the salary of health workers.
“Imbis na pag-ban sa mga nars ang atupagin, hindi ba dapat inasikaso na lang ang pagtaas ng pasahod ng ating frontliners?”
[Instead of banning nurses from going abroad, should we not use this to increase the salary of our frontliners?]
The Department of Health had also faced criticism over its overpriced procurement of PPEs.
The DBM responded in a statement, saying that it “encountered challenges in getting more qualified local suppliers capable of meeting the requirements of the DOH due to business disruption caused by the community quarantine and high global demand [for] medical supplies and equipment.”
