Health Ministry is 'partly ready' to respond to disasters, emergencies and health crises

RIGA - The Health Ministry is currently only "partially prepared" to respond to natural disasters, emergencies and health crises, so active work on this issue is still underway, representatives of the ministry informed the Saeima social and labor affairs committee on Tuesday.

The ministry said that an informative report on strategic access to medicines in times of crisis would be reviewed on June 25-26 and then submitted to the Cabinet of Ministers for approval.

Currently, thanks to the reallocation of funds and the support of the Interior Ministry, the situation with regard to the stock of medicines is generally good. Funding is available and medicines are gradually being procured in sufficient quantities in accordance with the contracts concluded.

The Health Ministry could not disclose the full amount requested for this purpose due to the restricted status of the information, but ministry representatives stressed that the amount was "large enough".

Representatives of the pharmacy sector as well as primary health care commented that there is still much to be done in emergency preparedness.

Ainis Dzalbs, a representative of the Latvian Association of Rural General Practitioners, also pointed to the problems.

"At the moment, the plans are more focused on the hospital stage, but fewer people will turn there in critical situations than in the primary health care stage," Dzalbs stressed.

In his view, primary healthcare as a whole is not currently prepared for disaster or crisis situations.

Primary care providers need to know the information and algorithm for dealing with crisis situations, but there is currently no uniform algorithm for action, the association's representative stressed.

In parallel, it should be ensured that primary care practices are independent in terms of electricity. As Dzalbs noted, floods and storms are enough to prevent medics from functioning. Therefore, there are already a number of goods that could be provided to primary care practices to ensure that they are prepared not only for military crises, but also for other potential crises.

Raina Dureja-Dombrovska, Executive Director of the Latvian Association of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers, informed that the idea to start producing some of the critical medicines locally in Latvia had been discussed last year. There has also been only one information report on this proposal so far.

Agnese Ritene, Chairperson of the Association of Pharmacies, stressed that it is important to focus on the pharmacy location plan, especially in the regions where the pharmacist is often the closest person who can inform the population about health issues. She noted that pharmacies do not currently keep a particularly large stock of medicines and that it should be clarified how large the stock should be.

During the meeting, the ministry representatives rejected the accusations of the pharmacy sector about insufficient meetings and information sharing. There had been enough meetings.

MP Ingrida Circene (New Unity) called for an immediate action plan to further strengthen preparedness by cutting red tape following the Health Ministry's information report, which is scheduled for consideration at the end of June.