 has been consistently making news over suspicion of an institutionalized corruption scheme.){kind=link}
FOR THE LAST three years, the Department of Health (DOH) has been consistently making news over suspicion of an institutionalized corruption scheme.
During the Senate Finance Committee hearing, Senator Raffy Tulfo took a swipe at the agency’s habit of buying “almost expired” medicines in order to get “kickbacks” during the tenure of Dr. Teodoro Herbosa as DOH Secretary.
The allegation was disclosed by the former broadcaster-turned-legislator during deliberations on the agency’s proposed 2027 budget.
Tulfo confronted newly-appointed Health Secretary Edwin Mercado over the possible scheme that has also led to the expiration of billions of pesos worth of medicines in government warehouses.
Incredulous over this repeat of wastage of medicine and funds, the senator cited that in 2023, at least P11 billion worth of expired drugs were “buried underground” if only to ensure that the dubious scheme won’t be discovered.
“Dapat d’yan may makulong. Dapat diyan may mapugutan ng ulo eh. Napaka-iskandalo ng amount na ‘yan,” an obviously pissed off Tulfo said.
Tulfo initially called out the DOH officials over whether it can “guarantee” that the medicine it procures for 2027 would not expire before use and then followed through to ask if there is a modus to get near-expired medicine in the procurement process.
“Ayon sa aking source, sinasadyang bibilhin about to be expired kasi mas mura at galing sa mga pinapaboran na mga supplier,” he noted.
“Just imagine how many millions of kickbacks in the past years for the procurement officer,” he added.
Barely a month into office, Mercado said that DOH undersecretaries who recently resigned handled the questionable procurement.
He then went on to identify the undersecretary as a certain Randy Escolango, who handled the department’s financial and supply chain management services.
Escolango resigned on August 15 while facing a complaint before the Office of the Ombudsman (OMB). DOH employees filed the complaint in June accusing him and former Health Secretary Herbosa of a “self-policing conflict of interest.”
Since 2015, the Commission on Audit (COA) has been flagging the DOH over its dubious procurement of medicines and vaccines procurement — P18.5 billion from 2015 to 2018, P2.2 billion in 2019, P95.15 million in 2020, P85 million in 2021, P7.4 billion in 2022, and P11.18 billion in 2023. The last figure includes more than 7 million vials of expired Covid-19 vaccines and 24,539 bags of donated dialysis solution.
In 2024, COA found P34.8 million of drugs already expired, with a further P99.5 million nearing expiration.