Vice President, Jessica Alupo commends Government’s efforts on medicinal storage and safety.

The Vice President of the Republic of Uganda, H.E Jessica Alupo has appreciated the efforts taken by the National Medical Stores (NMS) to minimize medicine theft in the country.

Alupo remarked this on Friday during her official visit to NMS headquarters where human medicines and other medical supplies to different Government units in the entire country are stored and then distributed.

She appreciated the Board and Staff of NMS for fulfilling their mission of effectively and efficiently supplying essential medicines and medical supplies to Public Health facilities in Uganda.

Many times, the Uganda population has claimed lack of medicine in hospitals they visit which has always put the government onto the wall. Alupo, is nonetheless optimistic that the pharmaceutical warehouse put up will help curb down the problem of storage.

“I am glad, therefore, to learn that you are soon getting remedy to this problem through an integrated Enterprise Resource Planning System,” she said.

Alupo added that she was happy to know that they are working on solving the problem of storage through a modern Pharmaceutical and Medical Equipment Warehouse at Kajjansi.

The NMS General Manager, Moses Kamabare, noted that the Kajjansi warehouse will have the capacity to produce at least 100 oxygen cylinders daily once completed.

It is also expected to be the largest government-owned medical warehouse in the East African region.

With the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Uganda in particular and the world at entirety, Alupo noted that the government can no longer depend on the complacency of waiting for eternal solutions.

“We have to support local innovations and inventions of medicines like Covidex. I am happy to know that NMS is in support of the Buy-Uganda-Build-Uganda (BUBU) policy. I encourage you to show it in practice,” Alupo remarked.

This comes after numerous guidelines from President Yoweri Museveni on the way forward on medicines which is one of the nine fundamental human needs.

The introduction of the NMS+ERP tool, an online monitoring tool aimed at improving transparency and accountability in the ordering of medicines, will go miles in improving visibility according to Alupo.

Kamabare revealed that NMS plus will be rolled out in three phases that is, the first phase being to digitalise the order system for hospitals, the second on connecting NMS to the stores of the respective health facilities and the third phase to track who has received which ilk of medicine.

It should be noted that according to the Finance ministry information, the biggest chunk of money in the 2021/22 Financial Year Budget amounting to UGX 197 Billion went to the Ministry of Health.