Kemsa again? Drugs, condoms, more billions vanish
The Kemsa warehouse in Embakasi, Nairobi. Kemsa lost medicines it's believed they were resold on the black market and to private chemists.
The UN-backed Global Fund has revealed fresh rot at Kenya Medical Supplies Authority (Kemsa) after it found out that 908,000 mosquito nets, 1.1 million condoms and tuberculosis drugs worth Sh10 million had disappeared from its warehouse.
Global Fund, which finances the fight against HIV/Aids, tuberculosis and malaria, has also raised the red flag over suspected fake suppliers demanding Sh1.66 billion from Kemsa.
The lost medicines are believed to have been stolen and resold on the black market and to private chemists, shining a spotlight once again on Kemsa over its graft record.
Kemsa is also accused of overstating the value of medicines by Sh640 million, with some types of drugs having been inflated 100 times, says an audit by Global Fund.
Some of the drugs, which were bought by cash from Global Fund, expired amid a shortfall in government hospitals.
The revelations come as Kemsa battles to clean its image after the State agency was engulfed in tender fraud over the procurement of Covid-19 medical supplies in 2020.
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