New Delhi: India may see a spurt in malaria cases this year, thanks to a slip-up by the country’s Central procurement agency, the Central Medical Service Society.
A tender floated to buy the Long-Lasting Insecticidal Nets (LLIN), the best way to prevent malaria in endemic areas, has fallen flat as it was found CMSS did not follow proper procedures while floating the tender.
As a result, it will have to be floated again. Throwing rules out of the window, the CMSS floated a tender worth Rs 150 crores to procure 50,000 nets in January 2015.
While the health ministry tender specifications clearly recommend a “global tender” for procuring these “specialised nets” as no Indian companies manufacture them, the CMSS chose not to float a global tender, so bid invitations were not sent to embassies, and the tender did not invoke a “proper competitive response”, leading to a “single-bid situation”.
Japan’s Sumitomo and Germany’s Vetergaard are the largest producers of long-lasting insecticidal bed nets.
The ministry has so far procured the nets from these firms.
Both Japan’s Sumitomo and Germany’s Vetergaard are registered with the Central Insecticides Board under agriculture ministry, another mandatory requisite for participating companies. The CMSS, however, quite callously decided against giving wider publicity due to which a registered firm did not participate in the process.
The three-member committee comprising of experts in the health ministry have now advised the procurement agency to issue a fresh global tender.
“As per recommendation of the ministry of finance in case of a single-bid situation, re-tendering should be resorted to. We have to follow the policy and have asked the agency to go for re-tendering,” said N.S. Kang, additional secretary in the health ministry.
The “magic nets” which result in reduction of mosquito density and thus in the reduction of overall malaria transmission were last procured by the Union health ministry in 2011.
Officials say the conducive season of breading has already begun and retendering may not help.
