The government will provide a “special” fund for the Public Health Ministry in order to pay the overdue subsidies to the hospitals and to allow for expenditures for medicines and fuel for the generators. The exact amount is as of yet unknown, but believed to be between RD$150 and RD$200 million. According to the newly-appointed Minister Sabino Baez, there “is not one penny” in the department’s coffers and his unit will have to depend on the good will of suppliers, who have already accorded the ministry with an initial “emergency” delivery of provisions. The minister told El Caribe reporter Itania Maria that “there is very little here.” Yesterday, Baez met with the head of the Program for Essential Medicines (PROMESA), Elena Fernandez, and Director of Hospitals Carlon Yunen. During the meeting, they outlined the amounts that would be needed in the short term to face the current crisis in the public hospital system, one that has been called “the worst in history” by the head of the Dominican Institute for Social Security, William Jana Tactuk.
A separate article in the Listin Diario reports on the World Bank and its reminder to the authorities that a RD$30-million loan to reform the public health sector will be canceled if it is not passed in Congress before the end of the year.