Central Medical Stores Trust blows funds on expired drugs

The Central Medical Stores Trust (CMST) is spending unspecified amount of money keeping medical drugs and equipment worth K370 million which a team of experts from the Ministry of Health, Lilongwe City Council (LCC) and Pharmacies, Medicines and Poisons Board (PMPB) condemned and recommended for destruction two years ago, Nation on Sunday has learnt.

CMST—a public trust mandated to procure medical drugs and equipment on behalf of government—says they halted the plan to destroy the medical drugs and equipment following an order from the Office of the President and Cabinet (OPC) holding the drug’s destruction.

But Chief Secretary to OPC George Mkondiwa yesterday said he was not aware of the matter, but said he would find out what prompted the order from his office at the material time.

The OPC order puts the trust in an awkward position where it is being forced to pay warehouses at Kanengo in Lilongwe to store the useless drugs and equipment.

CMST director of pharmaceutical operations Moses Chisale in an exclusive interview with Nation on Sundaysaid destruction of expired drugs has to be approved by the board following some specified procedures alongside a team of officials from the Ministry of Health, LCC and PMPB.

Said Chisale: “The batch has not been destroyed because queries arose from the Office of the President and Cabinet and the process was halted. Now CMST is paying for warehouses to store drugs which are useless as CMST waits for a final decision.

Chisale said destroying drugs is a costly exercise as the trust has to involve teams from the Health Ministry, the city council and PMPB across the regions where CMST has warehouses.

He said the K370 million which government used to buy the drugs should be considered wasted as the drugs have lost value.

“There was once a value attached to the drugs when they could be used, but that is no longer there, they are useless,” said Chisale.

In an earlier e-mail response, CMST public relations officer Hebert Chandilanga said “boarding off” drugs is a continuous exercise as some medicines and medical supplies expire on the shelf for various reasons, including change in treatment guidelines.

“But generally, boarding off must be avoided at all cost and CMST is working towards [normalising the situation] by, among other things, employing good procurement, warehousing and distribution practices.

Chandilanga said the current expired items were ordered and delivered during the pre-CMST days.

“It is CMST’s view that these items came in as a result of mis-procurement at that time,” he said.

He also said the rapid changes in technological development may have led to some of the items procured at the time becoming obsolete, leading to expiry on the shelf.

Some of the useless items in CSMT warehouse in Kanengo include the Plaster of Paris (PoP) materials—occupying a whole warehouse—some obsolete laboratory, dental and assorted surgical items.

“The items being boarded off and those out of stock are not the same. This means the items being boarded off did not and could not have improved the drug situation in any way.

“Since the creation of the trust, there has been no time when an item is boarded off while hospitals lacked it,” said Chandilanga.

Boarding off is an administrative function to properly/ethically get rid of expired/obsolete stocks, and the exercise is funded by CMST, according to Chandilanga.