"Why Has Mobile Airtime Levy Been Insufficient To Boost Medical Supplies?"

Dr Agnes Mahomva the permanent secretary in the Ministry of Health and Child Care (MOHCC) has said that it would be unfair to argue that the mobile airtime levy has not aided in the supply of medicines.

She was responding to a question during an interview with Sunday Mail reporter, Debra Matabvu last week. Her remarks come at a time when the health sector is currently facing a lot of challenges, from shortages of mainline drugs to broken down medical equipment in public health facilities. Below are excerpts from the interview:

Q: In 2014, Government put a 5 percent mobile airtime levy, which was ringfenced for the procurement of drugs and medicines. How much has been collected over the years? And how much has been collected this year alone. Why has it been insufficient to boost medical supplies over the years?

A: The mobile airtime levy, also known as the health levy, has been in place since (circa) 2017 and has to date collected about $63 million (RTGS).

Indeed, this levy was ringfenced for procurement of medicines and, yes, the MOHCC has managed to procure medicines using this fund.

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I do not think it is fair to say it has not augmented supplies. This innovative way of fundraising has saved us a lot. It has really helped us.

Unfortunately, the current harsh economic situation has seen the foreign currency from this local fund slowly go down.

This has, in turn, made it difficult for us to import the quantities of medicines we had hoped for.

This has, however, not dampened our drive at all.

We are confident we can, and in fact are still able, to reasonably stock up all our health facilities through innovative partnerships such as the recent partnership with India, China, Global Fund and others as highlighted earlier.

We will therefore continue to work on such partnerships.

More: Sunday Mail