How many prescriptions has AMLO’s ‘mega pharmacy’ filled?

It opened to great success in late December, but in its first four months of operation the federal government’s “Welfare Mega Pharmacy” didn’t even come close to fulfilling the role it was designed for.

In fact, the facility officially called the Federal Center for Storage and Distribution of Health Supplies (Cefedis) only dispensed 341 prescriptions between December 29 and April 29, according to El Universal newspaper, which presented a single Freedom of information request to the state. medical company Birmex, operator of the pharmacy.

In other words, the megapharmacy a warehouse that supplies drugs to public hospitals and clinics, and to individual patients, directly filled an average of just 2.7 prescriptions per day in its first four months of operation.

Not an impressive record for a facility that President Andrs Manuel López Obrador described as “possibly the largest pharmacy in the world.”

Inaugurating the pharmacy, located in the Mexican state municipality of Huehuetoca, López Obrador said that the establishment of the facility will allow “everyone to have the medicines they need” wherever they are in the country and whether they are rich or . poor

When he first proposed the creation of a “warehouse of all the world’s medicines in reasonable quantities”, he presented it as a “definitive way out” of the drug shortages that have plagued his government.

What’s the problem?

Universal reported at the end of January that Cefedis had stocks equivalent to less than 1% of the drugs it was designed to offer.

Zo Robledo, director of the Mexican Institute of Social Security (IMSS), a major health care provider, dismissed the report as “malicious” and insisted the megapharmacy had all the drugs it needed.

Despite this claim, El Universal reported on Tuesday that “the facility’s attempt to solve the country’s drug shortage” has so far “failed” due to its own “drug shortage.”

He said that the mega pharmacy did not buy any medicine before its inauguration, explaining that its stock was supplied “on loan” by the IMSS, the State Institute of Workers’ Social Security (ISSSTE) and the universal health scheme known as IMSS-Bienestar. .

The newspaper said that in its first four months of operation, the mega pharmacy received more than 95,000 phone calls.

More than 16,000 of these calls were made by people who had previously contacted Cefedis to order a medicine. They called again to follow up on their request because they hadn’t received their order. The data provided to El Universal by Birmex indicate that the vast majority of these people have not yet received the medication they requested.

Cefedis was unable to send the requested drugs in more than 27,000 calls because the people who ordered the drugs did not have a valid prescription or could not provide their CURP identification number, El Universal said.

Based on Birmex’s data, it seems unlikely that the mega-pharmacy would have been able to dispense most of the drugs requested, even if those making the requests had prescriptions and/or their CURP numbers.

Of the 341 prescriptions that the facility successfully dispensed, 210 were dispensed to ISSSTE patients, 129 to IMSS-Bienestar patients, and two to IMSS patients.

Birmex said Cefedis was seeking to fill an additional 1,168 prescriptions by obtaining the drugs requested from the IMSS, ISSSTE or IMSS-Bienestar.

It is clear that many drugs that the mega pharma is asked to supply do not reach the patients in a timely manner as promised by the federal authorities.

“The Mega Farmàcia del Benestar is a MEGA-FAILURE, it only dispenses 2.7 prescriptions a day”, Marko Corts, national president of the National Action Party, he wrote on social media platform Xon Tuesday.

“This is the Mexico of López Obrador and the health crisis [the federal government] caused The good news is that [opposition presidential candidate] Xchitl Glvez is coming,” he said.

With reports from El Universal