Kenya To Lose Millions Over Unsold COVID-19 Medical Supplies

Kenya’s auditor general General Nancy Gathangu says the country stands to lose $21 million in the procurement of COVID-19 medical supplies because the Kenya Medical Supplies Agency failed to follow procurement law.

Gathangu on Wednesday presented to the Senate a special report describing how the COVID-19 supplies were purchased between Kenya’s first confirmed coronavirus case on March 13 and July 31.

According to the report, Kenya purchased overpriced COVID-19 supplies, and following the government COVID-19 stats that keep decreasing every day, there is lower demand, and the agency may not be able to sell the stock.

Kenya Medical Supplies Agency purchased supplies worth $77 million which money was part of that acquired from the World Bank, and according to Gathanu, the agency flouted the law while in part using the money.

The report indicates that the agency’s management bought goods without doing a needs assessment or budgetary allocation and awarded contracts to companies that were just months old,  and now the country is to be in losses.

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Auditor general General Nancy Gathangu argued that despite putting in place guidelines for the procurement while purchasing the supplies, there is no evidence they were followed by the Agency.

The report also indicates regardless of the fact that these supplies were purchased as a matter of emergency, over 97% of the supplies purchased for COVID-19 were still in the agency’s warehouses as of September 18, 2020.

Kenya was previously recording alarming cases of COVID-19, the country saw a rapid increment in the cases on a daily basis, however, currently, the COVID-19 cases rapidly reduced and the curve is steadily flattening according to stats being released by the MOH.

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Current COVID-19 Sats In Kenya

According to data compiled by Kenya’s Ministry Of Health, the country recorded 184 new cases of the COVID-19 as of 1^st October 2020 from 4,700 samples tested in the last 24 hours.

The country’s total number of cumulative COVID-19 cases now stands at 38,713 and the cumulative total of tests done so far stands at 552,646.

Kenya also recorded 115 new recoveries 67 from the home-based care program and 48 from hospitals across the country pushing the total number of recoveries to 24,740.

The country’s total number of coronavirus fatalities rose to 707 after 7 patients succumbed between Wednesday and Thursday.

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