Government lines Sh3b for Kemsa supply chain
By George.Kebaso, July 11, 2023The government will inject a total of Sh3 billion in the Kenya Medical Supplies Authority (Kemsa) to enable it meet its enormous commodity supply demand to the counties and health facilities across the country.
Health Cabinet Secretary, Susan Nakhumicha revealed yesterday that the ministry had approved an initial Sh1 billion that will also address the turnaround time for restocking the authority’s warehouses with essential and critical medical items.
She said during a Kemsa-hosted suppliers and stakeholders brainstorming session in Nairobi that President William Ruto has pledged to release Sh2 billion for this exercise, which the authority has committed to mainly prioritise purchase and supply of essential commodities.
“For the past two years, Kemsa’s order fill rate has experienced significant volatility,” the CS said at the College of Insurance.
She explained that the central issue on the poor turn-around time in the supply of the essential commodities is a systemic failure on the part of contracted suppliers to deliver Health Products and Technologies (HPTs) in a timely manner, often falling short of the required quantities.
“This persistent problem demands immediate attention and solutions, as it impacts the overall accessibility and availability of critical medical commodities to healthcare facilities and patients,” she added.
Escalating prices
Compounding this challenge, Nakhumicha further revealed that the market for HPTs in Kenya is showing a worrying trend of continually escalating prices.
“If left unchecked, these increasing costs will obstruct the delivery of affordable, high-quality medical commodities,” she stated, noting that the affordability of HPTs is integral to ensuring access to healthcare services, particularly for low-income segments of the population.
However, she expressed confidence that this matter is going to be sorted out soon following the Ministry’s commitment to helping Kemsa’s order fill-rate turn-around time that has been oscillating between 30 to 50 percent recently.
“Last week we did approve – based on the Board’s request – a recapitalisation amount of close to Sh1 billion, and should be able to improve movement of essential medical items, and that will boost the fill-rate of Kemsa,” she said.
Equally, Nakhumicha disclosed that she is in conversation with her National Treasury counterpart, Prof Njuguna Ndung’u over the delayed funding. She said the discussion is around fast tracking this model of funding in order to give Kemsa money for the purpose of helping it to restructure its debts, to be able to actualise its mandate as the Universal Health Coverage (UHC) key player.
“Equally, we have plans at the level of Head of State in terms of recapitalising Kemsa, and the president has promised a recapitalisation amount of about Sh2 billion,” she said this amount will be released as soon, to enable Kemsa focus on the essential and critical items.
She noted that although the current fill rate at the authority stands at around 57 percent, is not good to guarantee quality service provision to patients, it is an improvement though from where it was two months ago at 30-40 percent.
“Fill rate of Kemsa is not a good thing, however, it is an improvement because two months ago we were at 30 and 40 percent. Today, we have moved up to 60 percent,” said the CS. The authority’s acting chief executive officer, Dr Andrew Mulwa committed that the situation will change in the next two months following the strategies the new board and management has put in place.