Patients groups rally in Ukraine as government fails to conduct essential drug purchase tenders
Hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian patients were left without drugs for treatment, when government did not manage to conduct tenders for 80% of drug purchases under the state health programmes, the joint press release from prominent patients organisations in Ukraine informs.
On September 24, 2014, patients groups and families have gathered in front of the Government Building to demand that Ukraine’s Prime Minister assumes personal responsibility so that the drug purchasing tenders are completed in full.
Among the programmes affected are HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, oncological diseases, haemophilia, multiple sclerosis, and some others.
“There was not a single time when in the last ten years of Ukraine’s independence that patients were left without essential drugs for treatment under such programmes as oncology, heamohplia, virus hepatitis, TB, HIV/AIDS and others. This is a complete failure of the Ministry of Health of Ukraine that we testify of. The Ministry is incapable of conducting drug tenders this year,” – said Dmytro Sherembey, the Head of “Patients of Ukraine” Charitable Fund.
Read the original press release here.
View photos from the demonstration here.
Source:
TB Europe Coalition
