Shady deal:Daily Star

The Shaheed Suhrawardy Medical College Hospital authorities have ordered buying an expensive eye surgery instrument apparently for an influential quarter to make money. The price of the machine has been shown in the tender document at Tk 11.6 crore while the actual price would be not more than Tk 3 crore, according to relevant sources.   The authorities have issued the work order in haste two weeks ago without assessing the need of the ophthalmology department and its capacity to operate the machine. They also ignored objections from the ophthalmology department head, Professor Sirajul Islam Mollah, to buying the machine -- Star S4 Excimer Laser -- manufactured by US-based Abbott Medical Optics. “I think buying the Lasik machine will not be practical,” said Prof Mollah in a recent letter to the hospital director, Prof AKM Mujibur Rahman. The letter mentioned that the department has no trained technicians to operate the machine.   For opposing the purchase, Prof Mollah was dropped from the purchase committee, according to different sources at the 375-bed public hospital located at the capital's Sher-e-Bangla Nagar.   Contacted, Prof Mollah said, “I have told the authorities whatever I had to tell.” He declined to comment further.   A doctor at the hospital said the ophthalmology department has an acute shortage of many basic instruments, including operating table, ophthalmoscope, slit lamp and auto refract metre. But the authorities are reluctant to buy those. Moreover, the department does not have an air-conditioned room that can accommodate the equipment, added the sources. The National Institute of Ophthalmology (NIO), only five minutes' walk from the Suhrawardy Hospital, bought a Lasik machine a couple of years back. But it is not being used currently. “If one needs Lasik surgery, he can get the service from the NIO. Why should Suhrawardy Hospital have the same equipment spending so much money?” said another doctor, preferring anonymity. Mitford Hospital also bought the machine two and a half years ago. But not more than 140 patients received the facility. The government has to spend at least Tk 5 to 7 thousand for using the equipment for every patient.   The Lasik machine was also bought for Barisal Medical College Hospital at Tk 11.35 crore recently. But it has remained useless in the absence of trained manpower. Contacted, BMCH Director Kamrul Hasan Selim said the process of buying the machine started around one and a half years ago and the authorities during the term of his predecessor invited bids following the requisition from the department of ophthalmology. The supplier, SP Trading, would provide four-week training to four hospital staff in Singapore. The four would go for the training soon. Asked whether there is any need for such an expensive machine in the hospital, the director said BMCH is the only such hospital in the entire south region and having the machine would definitely be helpful for patients. Sources said the influential quarter helped manage funds for purchase of the machine for Suhrawardy and BMCH hospitals allegedly in exchange of huge amount of money from the supplier. The Daily Star could not verify whether the supplier bribed anyone to ensure their sale. SP Trading, local agent of the American Medical Optics (AMO), outright rejected the allegation while talking to this correspondent. Neither Dhaka Medical College Hospital (DMCH) nor Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University (BSMMU) has the instrument though they have expertise and higher number of patients. Sources said influential people from the DG health office, health ministry and the hospitals are “behind the deal”. The specifications in the tender document have been drafted in a way that their favoured company wins the bidding, added the sources. Sensing irregularities in the tender process, other bidders protested the specifications at a pre-bidding meeting on June 8. “The hospital authorities assured us of changing the specifications. But they haven't done it,” one businessman said.      According to a source, the specifications mentioned by the hospital matched only with Star S4 Excimer Laser. Contacted, Suhrawardy Hospital Director Prof AKM Mujibur Rahman outright denied any irregularities in the process. He said they sent their requirements -- based on demand letters received from various departments of the hospital between April and May this year -- to the health ministry and the office of the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS).    “For the hospital's prestige and patients' special care, we can buy a Lasik machine,” he said, adding that it would also be helpful for medical students.   About the specifications, he said engineers along with three doctors of the department of ophthalmology, prepared “right specification” in a coordinated way. He brushed aside the allegations that any specific company has been favoured. About the opinion that buying such an expensive machine would not be viable when NIO is close by, he said, “How will our students learn then?” Professor Dr Sharfuddin Ahmed, chairman of BSMMU ophthalmology department, said such a sophisticated and expensive machine should not be in a hospital like Suhrawardy, which has neither the expertise nor a high number of patients. “If it is really needed, it should be in the BSMMU and DMCH considering the number of doctors and patients,” he told The Daily Star. Buying a Lasik machine for Suhrawardy Hospital will be wastage of public money, he added. According to a World Bank survey in 2012, only 49 percent of medical equipment in the public hospitals in Bangladesh are properly used, while the rest remain idle, uninstalled, dysfunctional or partly used. MM Niazuddin, secretary to the health ministry, said he has no knowledge about the purchase. “You deal with one or two issues, but I have hundreds to them,” he told this correspondent.