By Leonard Kamugisha Akida,
KAMPALA
The State House Health Monitoring Unit (HMU) has raised alarm over rampant drug theft in government health facilities, warning that the vice is costing lives and crippling service delivery.
HMU Executive Director, Dr. Warren Namara, said on Monday that while medicines are regularly delivered to hospitals and wards, many patients go without treatment because the drugs are stolen before reaching them.
“In many cases, medicines are delivered but do not reach patients. This leads to unnecessary loss of lives, yet these drugs are procured with taxpayers’ money,” Namara said.
He revealed that amendments are currently before Parliament seeking stiffer penalties for drug theft. “Unlike in the past, when punishments did not vary with the scale of theft, the proposed law would impose tougher sanctions to deter culprits,” he added.
Namara made the remarks at the Uganda Media Centre during a joint press briefing with the National Medical Stores (NMS) on new measures to curb drug theft and illegal sales of government medicines. He attributed drug shortages crisis to people hoarding medicines they do not need from different hospitals, depriving patients with genuine prescriptions of access to life-saving treatments.
NMS General Manager, Moses Kamabare, announced that the agency has enhanced its Delivery Monitoring Tool (DMT), a mobile solution that enables real-time tracking of medicines from NMS warehouses in Kajjansi and Entebbe to health facilities countrywide.
“The system alerts stakeholders whenever medicines are dispatched and received at facilities, showing details of the supplies and the health workers who received them,” Kamabare explained. SMS alerts are automatically sent to District Health Officers, Resident District Commissioners, and MPs on the Health Committee, among others.
He added that all government-supplied drugs are now embossed with the label “Government of Uganda–Not for Sale” to make it easier for the public to distinguish them from privately procured medicines.
Kamabare, however, noted that once drugs are delivered, accountability shifts to health workers. “With these systems, Ugandans can now see where their medicines go and who has received them,” he said.
Uganda Police Spokesperson, ACP Kituuma Rusoke, urged the public to play an active role in safeguarding public health resources by reporting suspected drug theft and illegal sales to security agencies.
