The ministry acknowledges that it is not always known where the money for the fight against corona has gone, but relies on the fact that the deals were closed. during a crisis situation. “The cabinet has considered that the health of healthcare employees was more important than administrative correctness,” write the responsible outgoing ministers De Jonge and Van Ark.
Tools
The deal that is definitely number 1 is the one with the Landelijk Consortium Hulpmiddelen (LCH). That received a total of 1.95 billion euros from the ministry. With this money, mouth caps, aprons, glasses and gloves were bought from all kinds of suppliers. Healthcare institutions could then purchase these essential products at a reduced rate.
The largest part of the 1.95 billion went to the company Mediq. It received 1.2 billion in advances to arrange the purchase, sale and distribution of the products. With this money, Mediq and the LCH have again concluded separate contracts with suppliers of mouth caps. Little is known about this, except de deal with Sywert van Lienden.
The ministry has also concluded several other major agreements with suppliers to obtain (then scarce) resources. Those deals appear to have been concluded by the ministry outside the LCH and Mediq. For example, a party called “Supplier N” by the ministry received 56 million euros for mouth caps. Another received 38 million euros for face masks. “Supplier U” received 23 million for securing consumables.
“Supplier S” received 27 million euros for respiratory systems. “Supplier X” received 11 million for collecting blood plasma from people who have had covid-19, presumably this concerns blood bank Sanquin. Together, 2.1 billion euros were spent on medical aids.
Tests
The second largest expenditure item concerns everything related to corona tests. This concerns the test materials, which at any time were very scarce, and to carry out the tests by laboratories. The ministry has concluded ten large agreements worth 1.8 billion euros.
Most of the money for the testing went to RIVM, which received 835 million euros. Furthermore, “supplier P” received 40 million for the delivery of test kits. Part of the money went to the microbiological labs that carry out corona tests on behalf of the GGD and the purchase of rapid tests.
A major cost item are also the agreements with Unilabs and Saltro, with these two megalabs agreements have been made for a guaranteed test capacity. It is not known exactly how much the labs received per test, but the amounts are probably in the millions.
Vaccines
The ministry’s third largest post was vaccinating against Covid-19. At least 1.1 billion was spent here in 2020. The largest part, 800 million, was intended for the RIVM for the implementation of the vaccination campaign.
331 million euros has been transferred to pharmaceutical companies to buy the vaccines. This means that about 83 million doses of vaccine have been purchased by 2020. This equates to a few euros per dose. But as it turned out, there are big price differences per vaccine: a dose of Pfizer/BioNTech costs about 12 euros and a dose of AstraZeneca only 1.78 euros.
GGD
The GGD is the fourth in the list with the 25 most expensive deals. In 2020, five major agreements were concluded with the municipal health service worth 681 million euros.
For example, the call center for corona questions cost 223 million euros. 116 million euros has been transferred for hiring telephone operators for source and contact research. EUR 19 million has been transferred for the CoronIT IT system for the registration of test and prick appointments.
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