CEO defends antivenom charge

The chief executive officer of the Port Moresby General Hospital has refuted claims that the hospital seeks full cost recovery from patients with absolutely no financial means.

This comes after a recent post on social media about Charles Campbell Toxinology Centre condemning the decision by PMGH management to charge snakebite patients a K15000 fee for antivenom.

CEO Dr Umesh Gupta said the board, management, doctors and nurses of the Port Moresby General Hospital will not let any patient die for lack of funds.

Dr Gupta said it is completely false, libel and malicious to state that Port Moresby General Hospital is going to charge from those with no financial means.

He has given his assurance that the hospital will not let any patients die for lack of funds, although they would like to collect some money from those who can afford it so that they can save those who cannot.

Although there are charges for the antivenom, Dr Gupta says all the emergency doctors are fully empowered to completely waive off the charges for those who cannot afford it.

He further says in an emergency, like snakebites, where time is of essence, doctors will treat and ask questions later as there is no pressure on payments for such grievous conditions.

The hospital depends on the National Department of Health to purchase vials of antivenoms however, the department has been unable to supply a single vial for more than a year.

Vials for antivenom are bought from CSL, a company based in Australia.

Unfortunately, CSL is the only manufacturer that is approved for supply in PNG, thus factors such as demand and supply, cost of manufacturing, selling competition, etc, make the antivenom vial costly in PNG.

The cheapest antivenom vial costs K13,500.

The Charles Campbell Toxinology Centre, an antivenom research centre, is the locally based facility that supplies the antivenom to the hospital for free.

While the hospital acknowledges the work of the Centre, the CEO says they have been unable to supply antivenom vial for the last three months.

The Charles Campbell Toxinology Centre is a partnership between the School of Medicine and Health Sciences at the University of Papua New Guinea and the Global Snakebite Initiative. 

The research centre is based at the School of Medicine and operates a snakebite clinic within the Emergency Department at the Port Moresby General Hospital.

The Centre also has a Mobile Intensive Care Ambulance Service specifically set up to enable them to send specialist medical teams to safely retrieve the most seriously ill snakebite victims from outlying areas in Central Province.

Their collaboration with international research institutions has led them to the development of a new antivenom for treating snakebite in PNG.

The Centre says it will continue to provide the hospital with the antivenoms they have with no cost whatsoever.

Author: 
Annette Kora