Author: Klevis Paloka
7.5 billion ALL has been spent by the Albanian state since the beginning of the pandemic until May 2021, only for tenders in the field of health for the fight against Covid, as well as for contracts for the provision of anti-covid vaccines. From March 2020 and following 14 months, it turns out that state institutions procured 214 tenders. Of these, 193 tenders with a value of 4.4 billion ALL have been finalized and concluded. While the expenses for vaccines amount to 3.1 billion ALL, referring to what has been made public by the Albanian government.
In the vast majority, it is understood that the institutions have mostly needed equipment directly related to the pandemic, not only from the field of medicine, such as vaccines, oxygen, but also protective equipment, tests/swabs, various devices and drugs and disinfectants. At least this trend is shown by the nature of the procured tenders.
Pandemic hospitals
Of these tenders, the health institutions that have procured the most tenders during the pandemic are the "Shefqet Ndroqi" University Hospital, the Ministry of Health, the "Mother Teresa" University Hospital Center , the Directorate of the Lezha Regional Hospital, the Institute of Public Health, the Durrës Regional Hospital, etc.
Respectively, the "Shefqet Ndroqi" University Hospital , converted during the pandemic into an anti-Covid hospital, has procured 76 tenders. The Ministry of Health, 29 tenders, the University Hospital Center has developed 16 tenders, the Directorate of the Regional Hospital of Lezha 13 tenders, the IHP 10 tenders and the Durrës Regional Hospital has procured 6 tenders.
Even though it procured only 29 tenders, the total number of tenders developed by the Ministry of Health amounts to 1.38 billion ALL, to be followed by QSUT, which developed only 16 tenders. However, the total of these tenders is almost as much as the Ministry of Health, i.e. 1.38 billion ALL, while in third place for expenses is the "Shefqet Ndroqi" University Hospital, which has spent about 620 million ALL. PIH ranks fourth with 10 procured tenders worth 252 million ALL.
Everyone asked for medicine
Medicines and drugs have been the most sought-after product during the announced tenders, and this is shown by the 75 contracts in total tendered by the "Shefqet Ndroqi" Hospital and the Ministry of Health.
And as expected, in second place are tenders and requests for protective equipment , which were procured by 20 institutions and 40 contracts in total. Third place is occupied by tenders for oxygen with 33 contracts carried out by 15 tendering institutions. Following these are tenders for the purchase of tests/swabs , where 22 contracts were carried out by 4 institutions, while the top five list is closed by 15 secret contracts according to VKM no. 203 , carried out in 2020, where 15 contracts were carried out by 2 tendering institutions.
What about vaccines and disinfectants?
Even though it is not included in the list of those categories that have the most tenders, in terms of budgetary expenses, the first place is occupied by contracting for vaccination. So far, about 3.1 billion ALL have been spent, to be followed by the expenses for the purchase of oxygen. The total amount spent on the purchase of oxygen is 2.1 billion lek. In the third place in terms of the value of expenses are the contracts for protective equipment, where about 953 million ALL were spent, in the fourth place are the contracts for the purchase of tests/tampons with 952 million ALL and in the fifth place are the contracts for equipment with about 200 million ALL. While what stands out is the fact that only 97 million ALL were spent on disinfectants, during the period when at the same time the main appeal of doctors and high officials was the demand for hand washing.
Another fact is revealed by shedding light on the developed tenders. The Albanian state has spent more than what has been made public, where it appears that the government has spent 30 million dollars or about 3.1 billion lek.
More Sinovac
The first place is taken by the contract with “Keymen Ilac Sanayi ticaret anonym sirket (Sinovac)” , for which the Albanian state has taken out of its pocket 20 million dollars or 2 billion lek based on the two VKMs that show the figures that have been paid. The two payments for the Chinese vaccine were made in March 2021, which is also shown in VKM no. 174 , and the other payment was made in June 2021, which is also shown in VKM no . 357. In second place is the contract with “ Pfizer export by ”, where 5,9 million dollars or about 620 million lek were spent, while in third place is the contract with “ Gavi Alliance ”, where the Albanian state has spent 4.1 million dollars or 430 million lek.
For the other two contracts with "Pfizer Overseas LLC" and "Human Vaccine LLC (Sputnik V)" there is no official information on how much money was spent.
But according to an article on the biospace.com website published on June 15, 2021, the prices of vaccines per dose are as follows: for the "Pfizer-BioNTech" vaccine, a dose costs $19.50, a dose of the "AstraZeneca" vaccine costs $5.25, for the "Sputnik V" vaccine, it costs $10 per dose, and the Chinese vaccine "Sinovac" also has the highest price per dose, its dose costs $29.75.
In our country, according to the publications of the Ministry of Health, since the start of vaccination on January 11, 2021, a total of 1,005,663 doses of the vaccine against Covid-19 have been administered, of which 426,111 citizens have received both doses of the anti-Covid vaccine.
Oxygen and the winning company
Then in second place, in terms of the figures spent, are purchases for oxygen, where about 2.1 billion lek were spent excluding VAT. What is noticeable is that most of these tenders were won by two companies, namely the company "GTS- Gazra Teknike Shqiptare" with 20 contracts worth 1.91 billion lek and the company "Messer Albagaz Shpk" with 9 contracts with a total value of 196 million lek.
But " GTS-Gazra Teknike Shqiptare shpk " is a company owned by the Italian company "SOL spa" which won the first tender from health institutions in 2016 and from that time until June 2021 has won 111 tenders worth 2.48 billion lek excluding VAT and 84% of the total value of contracts for this company in the health sector since 2016 are Covid tenders.
This company has won a total of 30 Covid tenders with a total value excluding VAT of 2.08 billion lek held in 13 health institutions. These tenders are mainly for the purchase of oxygen and maintenance-repair of health systems. The observation shows that in 23 tenders the company was the only competitor and in only 2 cases was it not the only competitor in the competition.
Although it has won tenders totaling 2.08 billion lek, so far this company has only received half of it, 1 billion lek , from the state treasury, this is because some tenders are framework agreements.
The institutions where this company has won the most tenders are: QSUT with 8 tenders, Durrës Regional Hospital with 6 tenders, "Shefqet Ndroqi" University Hospital and the Ministry of Health with 2 tenders each, etc.
The institution that ranks first in winning the most tenders is QSUT, where this company has won a value of 1.1 billion lek or 53% of the total value won, followed by the "Shefqet Ndroqi" Hospital with about 455 million lek or 21.8% of the total value.
After the company "GTS" , the second to benefit the most in terms of total value is the company " Evita Shpk " , a company that is owned by a Dutch company Arimo BV at 72.5% of the capital and Ertel Kërçuku at 27.5%.
The total value obtained from tenders for this company is around 630 million lek excluding VAT, where it has generally supplied institutions with kits/reagents and tests for Covid-19. Of the 4 tenders it has won, the Ministry of Health has the largest figure with a total of 616 million lek or 98% of the total value and from the “Shefqet Ndroqi” Hospital it has won 11.5 million lek.
Like the company "GTS" , this company has won 3 tenders as the only one in the competition, while in the other tender all competitors were disqualified. This company has won 110 contracts in healthcare since 2016, where the total value is 1.31 billion, so almost 50% of the total value has been won from Covid tenders. From the state budget, this company has so far been paid 281 million lek for Covid tenders alone.
Meanwhile, in third place, which has won the most tenders in terms of total value, is the company " Intermed shpk " , which has won about 385 million lek for Covid tenders alone. This company has won all three tenders from the Ministry of Health with the object of "Purchase of items for personal protective measures and for the purchase of medicines" . Like the other two companies, this company has had the greatest profit from Covid tenders, since from 2016 to June 2021 it has won 227 tenders with health institutions that reach a total value of about 614 million lek, so it is noticeable that more than half of the value won from other tenders.
While from the state budget, this company was paid about 96 million ALL for the Covid tenders alone.
