THE Commission on Audit has aired concern over the failure of eight public hospitals in Cotabato province to complete their airborne infection isolation rooms (AIIR) as required by the Department Health under Department Memorandum No. 0062 issued February 4, 2020.
In the audit report on the province released May 20, government auditors named the hospitals as the Cotabato Provincial Hospital, M’lang District Hospital, Aleosan District Hospital, Arakan Valley District Hospital, Fr. Tulio Favali Municipal Hospital, President Roxas Provincial Community Hospital, Alamada Provincial Community Hospital, and Dr. Amado B. Diaz Provincial Foundation Hospital.
Under the rules, the AIIR must be single-occupancy rooms with negative pressure relative to surrounding areas, to minimize the airborne transmission of the coronavirus.
Of the eight, only Cotabato Provincial Hospital is close to completion with 60 percent of the required work done.
The Arakan Valley District Hospital and Fr. Tulio Favali Municipal Hospital have not even started any kind of work.
The rest are between 24 to 26 percent into the building stage.
Auditors noted that the DOH required all government-run hospitals to build an operational AIIR “to comply with patient placement guidelines and isolation standards.”
The audit team also reported delays in the delivery of various hospital equipment worth at least P25 million that were purchased on July 23, 2020 but arrived only on December 9 to 22, 2020.
Among these were 108 mechanical hospital beds, 70 hospital mattresses, 60 bedside tables, 60 oxygen regulators, 50 economical hospital beds, and 44 IV stands.
The audit team attributed the delay to strict quarantine protocols, travel restrictions, and the capacity of suppliers to provide the volume of order.
It commended the provincial government for “providing an appropriate supplemental plan and budget support” for the procurement of emergency supplies and equipment.
The provincial government assured the COA that it will continue conducting a “rigid evaluation of suppliers” to address issues observed in the audit report.
