Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, July 30) — Health Secretary Francisco Duque III insisted there is no conflict of interest even if his family’s pharmaceutical company bagged two government contracts to supply medicine to the Department of Health during his term.
Duque on Tuesday stressed that Doctors Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (DPI), a firm owned by his family, secured supply contracts from the national government months before he assumed office in October 2017.
“I wasn’t the Health Secretary then when the award was made… On its face it looks like I was already the Secretary of Health, but the reckoning date is not the end of the contract; it has to be the beginning of the contract, which was 2016,” he told CNN Philippines.
The supply contract was awarded to his family’s company in December 2016, but it lasted until December 2017 — months after he became Health Secretary for the second time.
“I had no way of finding out that there was this contract and that it was going to end one month later,” Duque added.
The Health Secretary said he had already divested his “minor” shares, right, and interest in his family’s pharmaceutical company in 2006.
Senator Panfilo “Ping” Lacson on Monday bared the apparent conflict of interest involving Duque and his brother Gonzalo, the newly-appointed head of the Philippine Coconut Authority.
Related: Lacson bares Duque-owned medicine supplier bagging gov’t contracts
The lawmaker questioned the “mere coincidence” that DPI became an accredited government contractor and supplier the same year Sec. Duque was appointed as Health Chief for the first time in 2005. He added that the pharmaceutical firm has already been shut down in March 2015 after multiple violations and product recalls under the watch of Duque’s successor, then-Secretary Janette Garin. However, the company reacquired a license to operate as a drug manufacturer — complete with an “automatic renewal” of license — from the Food and Drug Administration, a unit of DOH, Lacson said.
Lacson said these appear to be violations of Republic Act 6713, or the code of conduct for public officials.
The Duque brothers are also facing plunder raps before the Office of Ombudsman, over a lease contract their family’s company entered into with a regional office of the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth). Complainants — mostly parents of alleged Dengvaxia victims — accused the Health Secretary of conflict of interest for supposedly allowing the PhilHealth office to rent their family’s property, the Educational and Medical Development Corporation building.
WellMed controversy
Duque also confirmed the exposé of Lacson that WellMed Dialysis Center, a firm that allegedly filed bogus claims from PhilHealth, continues to receive payments from government funds.
“I think that’s right. There’s no denial,” the Health Secretary said.
Lacson said that based on PhilHealth’s data, WellMed received over P1.2 million in June, even if its accreditation was suspended the same month.
“Not only did Wellmed continue to receive payments, it was also paid in record speed, with turn around time as short as two (2) days at the time when the fraud was already made public. Kanino ba nagmamano itong may ari ng Wellmed at tila napakalakas?” he said.
Duque also clarified his links to WellMed and its owner, Brian Sy. He admitted that he was one of the principal sponsors in Sy’s wedding in 2014, but he denied personally knowing him. He said he was invited by Sy’s father-in-law, who was his friend in med school.
“Back at that time I did not have the crystal ball to check or to see that this Brian Sy was going to be involved in this brazenly fraudulent criminal activities meant to defraud the PhilHealth of its much needed resources. That’s why I felt so bad when I found out,” he said.
It has been discovered that PhilHealth has been paying ghost claims to WellMed Dialysis Center in Quezon City. The senator also cited several hospitals that reportedly received overpayments from the state-run insurance fund, which went as high as 2,508 percent for the Bondoc Peninsula District Hospital, which filed claims for P200,397 for pneumonia but PhilHealth recorded payments of over P5 million to the facility.
