TIGHTER PUBLIC-PRIVATE LINKS IN COVID RESPONSE PITCHED
PUBLIC and private leaders have agreed certain measures must be adjusted and specific policies pursued to improve the national Covid-19 response, especially now that the country is entering the vaccination phase.
Cosette Canilao, former executive director of the Public-private Partnership (PPP) Center, on Wednesday said the government needs to reactivate its efforts in stringing together the public and private sectors in developing state hospitals. She shared such a move was initiated during her stint with the PPP Center, but is now rejected as a primary option by the present administration.
The government under President Duterte has changed its style in building its infrastructure, as it shuns PPPS as a form of funding developments in favor of foreign lending and tax hikes.
During Canilao’s time as PPP Center chief, she said the government was exploring a project in which the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM) was being studied for partnership with private firms. Investors are considering the RITM as a possible developer
and manufacturer of vaccines frequently used in the Philippines.
“The public health system, when I was still with the PPP Center, was one of the things we were pushing then on how we can use PPP to improve our public health system,” Canilao explained in a webinar on public-private collaboration hosted by the Ateneo School of Government and the Ayala Corp.
“In the early days of my being with the PPP Center, we looked at the RITM, working with private partners, to manufacture vaccines and for common vaccines that we typically use here in the
Philippines, but that didn’t push through. Those are the things we should look at again, because we saw how the public sector can help in improving our social services,” she added.
Canilao reminded policymakers they need to involve the private sector in responding to these trying times, as relying solely on government measures may come up short due to bureaucratic red tape.
“In government, there are certain regulations that we have to follow, secure approvals from not only the executive but at times the legislative sector. That’s the system that we have in place,” Canilao said.
SEN. Juan Edgardo M. Angara agreed with Canilao’s assessment that government procedures, at times, hinder authorities from acting on pressing issues.
He said the Covid-19 Vaccination Program Act signed in February by the President may change the way things are carried out, particularly on the local government level. Angara cited, for one, the amendments introduced to the Local Government Unit Code and the Auditing Code to give localities the ability to make down payments for vaccine purchases.
“I think in the recently passed vaccination law, we had to amend our LGU code and the auditing code because precisely we have to respond to these times,” Angara said.
“We had to adjust them because LGUS, for instance, were not allowed to make down payments for goods which have yet to be delivered. We know that vaccines have to be paid 50 percent in advance, [and] we had some frantic mayors and governors calling us up they might be sued [if they violate the law],” the lawmaker added.
Angara vowed the Senate, in coordination with the House of Representatives, will keep an eye on laws that need amending to improve the cooperation between the public and private sectors.