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The Supreme Audit Office of Slovakia has analysed the outbreak and highlighted shortcomings in the Slovak health system’s pre-outbreak preparedness and outbreak management.
The Supreme Audit Office of Slovakia (NKÚ) has conducted five major audits and published three analytical reports focused on the pandemic response, ensuring that lessons learned are used to improve future response capabilities.
“It is impossible to get through a crisis without a comprehensive analysis of the actions and behaviour of all parties involved once the crisis is over. This cannot be done simply to look back at the past, but to adapt legislation and crisis management systems for the future,” NKÚ spokesperson Daniela Bolech Dobáková told Euractiv.
The COVID-19 pandemic has directly claimed more than 21,000 lives in Slovakia. In 2021, Slovakia tied with Bulgaria for the most significant decline in life expectancy in the European Union, and the excess mortality rate caused by the COVID-19 pandemic ranked fifth in the EU.
The report covers procurement of medical equipment, stockpiling, the impact of the pandemic on education, and financial support for citizens, villages, and research facilities.
The report said the audit found that the infectious disease prevention and control system had defects in concepts, procedures and legislation, and lacked a database for data collection and analysis.
Why now?
“The State Auditors did not previously participate in this audit activity because they wanted to obtain final, not partial information. Based on the results of this analysis, we will decide whether an in-depth review through an audit action is necessary or whether the conclusions drawn from this analytical activity are sufficient,” added Bolech Dobáková.
The summary report is one of the few analytical reports on the management of the outbreak that have been published. Euractiv asked the Supreme Audit Office whether it coordinated with MP Kotlar’s separate investigation into the outbreak, as MP Kotlar seemed to be focusing on similar aspects of the outbreak based on the limited information provided.
“The analysis of the subject is entirely led by NKÚ. The office communicates primarily with the Ministry of Health and uses data from official completions and settlements,” she said.
The progress and outcome of his investigation remain unknown.
Lack of reserves and high procurement costs
The audit criticised the National Material Reserve Bureau for its inadequate preparedness and its failure to ensure critical supplies were stockpiled in the event of an emergency.
From 2008 to 2020, no crisis management body in Slovakia identified the need to replenish emergency reserves with specific medical supplies. As a result, when the first wave of the pandemic hit, the state reserves were insufficient. Moreover, as of September 15, 2020, only 16% of the state reserves were filled with medical supplies.
Another problem reported comes from the procurement of medical equipment: “Procurement shows that various medical supplies are overpriced, especially medical masks, shoe covers, protective clothing, gloves and goggles.”
In some cases, masks were procuring prices as much as eight times higher, according to the office.
“The Supreme Audit Office has no information on whether individual responsibility has been established. The office makes recommendations to the relevant authorities, who must determine whether there are legal options against those responsible,” Bolech Dobáková explained.
Millions of unused vaccines
The Supreme Audit Office highlighted vaccine procurement as a major issue. They noted that although Slovakia did not need to purchase any doses of vaccines in 2022, it still received an additional 5.8 million doses. The procurement of these unused vaccines cost 151 million euros of public funds.
As of the end of 2022, Slovakia’s vaccine stockpile exceeded 6.1 million doses.
Asked about the possibility of donating vaccines, Bolech Dobáková said: “The question of donating vaccines is now a thing of the past. There was interest in vaccines when the pandemic was not completely over. We managed to donate some vaccines – this is a fact, we have not yet assessed whether this was the right or wrong decision.”
She added: “There is currently a lack of interest in vaccines, so the idea of donating the vaccines we have in our stockpile is more philosophical than practical.”
The topic of pandemic management is still a widely discussed topic in Slovakia and NKÚ wants to continue evaluating different aspects in order to improve the system for future crises.
“At this moment, we cannot clearly indicate whether there have been any systemic changes based on our series of audits focused on responding to extraordinary and emergency situations during the pandemic, as new measures have been continuously introduced this year. At the same time, we will most likely revisit this in future follow-up audits to verify which measures have been implemented,” Dobakova said.
(Author: Filip Áč, Editors: Vasiliki Angouridi, Brian Maguire | Euractiv Advocacy Lab)
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