President Ali Bongo Ondimba.
LIBREVILLE, July 31, 2023 (AGP) – To ensure equality in access to health care and products, the President of the Republic, Ali Bongo Ondimba, initiated, during the seven-year term that is ending, the project of functional strengthening of hospital pharmacies in the country’s health structures.
The permanent availability of drugs and consumables in health structures was a concern for the Gabonese head of state. The complaints of his fellow citizens in public hospitals had already become recurrent, due to the fact that patients were forced to go and buy drugs in pharmacies, often far from the structure where the sick are interned. It is in view of all the difficulties encountered by patients in hospital structures in Gabon and to relieve the populations, that the government, on the instructions of the Head of State, was led to find a solution.
On July 13, 2022, a co-management contract for hospital pharmacies, between the National Pharmaceutical Office (OPN) and the university hospitals in Greater Libreville, was signed. This agreement also ensures the supply of the hospital pharmacy, the distribution of drugs and other health products to the various departments of the hospital, the functional organization of the hospital pharmacy as well as the dispensing of pharmaceutical products to the patients of these CHUs.
It should be noted that this initiative also falls within the framework of the reform of the National Pharmaceutical Office which aims, beyond the methods of management of hospital pharmacies, to provide better care for patients.
On March 29, 2023, President Ali Bongo Ondimba received containers of medicines at the headquarters of the National Pharmaceutical Office. A total of 22 containers containing the equivalent of two years’ stock of medicines, intended to supply the hospital pharmacies of the regional hospital centres.
Thus, the nine provinces of the country are now benefiting from this laudable action to succeed in increasing the availability of essential drugs. An initiative that also contributes to significantly reducing the final cost of drugs for populations. Especially since the drugs concerned are those intended to treat the most common pathologies, among others, antimalarials, antibiotics, electrolytes, anesthetics.
« The initiative makes it possible to meet the most essential health needs. It was initiated by the Head of State, Ali Bongo Ondimba, to strengthen health capacities in the country. It is a strategy that covers all aspects of the health field“, confided to us an authorized source, in Libreville.
Elie NGOUNGOUROU/AGP
