Vitis Group of Companies’ Foundation yesterday came to the aid of Port Moresby General Hospital to address drug shortage and other necessities lacking at the city’s hospital.
The Vitis Foundation donated a K5000 cheque together with vital medicines and consumables worth K35,000 to the PMGH.
The Foundation Chairman, Dr Sergey Mossin made the presentation to PMGH Director Medical Services, Dr. Koni Sobi.
After the hospital management and staff expressed frustration and concern over shortage of essential medical drugs and consumables on social media and mainstream media, Vitis Group of Companies is the first to respond positively.
The company was able to donate several medical items including essential drugs and personal protection equipment such as the hand gloves, hand sanitizers and some of Vitis’ own Mosin flavoured water and beverages.
The medical drugs and consumables were products of Fortuna Pharmacy, which is a subsidiary of the Vitis Group of Companies.
Manager, Joanne Santos said Fortuna Pharmacy has been operating for three years and it has supplied medicines to Port Moresby General Hospital in the past.
“During the pandemic time Mr Mosin also wanted to donate something for the hospital to help not only the sick people but also the frontliners with PPE and alcohol for hand sanitizer produced by Fortune Pharmacy and Mr Mosin,” said Ms Santos.
Dr Mosin said it has been two years since the COVID-19 pandemic and it is still continuing, disrupting businesses, jobs and private lives. It is affecting the country and the world so in such difficult times, the community needs to help each other to overcome and go back to normal operations and normal life.
“Our doctors, nurses, carers in this difficult time very dangerous for themselves too. They are still standing at the front to protect our country against this deadly virus,” said Dr Mosin.
In response, Dr. Sobi on behalf of the hospital board and the CEO thanked Dr Mosin and the Vitis Foundation for the timely donation. He acknowledged that the last two years had been challenging years.
“We are the clinical front. We focus on clinical needs of patients in the hospital. Not only COVID patients but in general TB, pneumonia, malaria and other injuries and medical conditions presented to the hospital,” Dr. Sobi said.
He added that the global pandemic has created many difficulties in the movement of freight of medical drugs and consumables just like the experiences of business houses bringing in goods into the country.
“We have relied heavily on our partners on donations, companies, businesses, individuals and groups and communities. On behalf of the board, the CEO and executive management and staff of Pom Gen, thank you to Vitis Group of Companies and Dr Mosin,” said Dr Sobi.
He commented that this time the country is going through the fourth surge of COVID-19, which started almost a week ago.
“There’s a big contrast to what we experienced in September-October 2021 to what we experiencing now. This is a disease that’s easily spreading very fast and involving almost every one of us,” Dr. Sobi added.
He said quite a number of hospital staff contracted the virus and were sick in the last two weeks but many have recovered and returned to work. He highlighted that during the two weeks staff roster was affected putting more strain on those on duty.
However, he noted that many of those staff have reported to work, keeping the services going and at this point, there is no indication of scaling down services.
With such a donation of essential gloves, masks and hand sanitizers and consumables are high moving items covering 18 months or so.
