Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.com) - The COVID-19 pandemic has become a great new experience in many ways, including in the increase in the supply of essential medical products. What lessons are important to learn in this direction were discussed on 9 June 2020 by participants in an online conference organized by the National Chamber of Innovative Healthcare of Uzbekistan and the British Crown Agents. This was reported by the press service of the National Chamber of Innovative Health of the Republic of Uzbekistan.

Since February 2019, this company has been a partner of the National Chamber; a Memorandum of Cooperation has been signed between the parties. The history of Crown Agents is 187 years old and organized in 1833, it was the State Department of the British Government. Today it is an international multidisciplinary non-profit organization, one of the activities of which is the organization of supplies for the health needs of various countries.

The online conference was attended by Crown Agents Director Brian Richmond (from the UAE), Tatyana Korotchenko (Kiev), Head of the Representative Office in Ukraine, and Larisa Kokorenko, Regional Manager for Central Asia (Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan).

The online conference was attended by about 50 specialists, representatives of the WHO Office in the Republic and the Embassy of Uzbekistan in the UK. The guests of the office of the National Chamber in Tashkent were Bahrom Almatov, deputy director of the Agency for Sanitary and Epidemiological Welfare and Nigora Allaberganova, chief specialist of the State Inspection for Sanitary and Epidemiological Surveillance under the Cabinet of Ministers of Uzbekistan.

Opening the online conference, the President of the National Chamber, Rovshan Izamov, noted that the cooperation that began more than a year ago made it possible today, when the whole world gained experience in combating the COVID-19 pandemic, to discuss an urgent topic that is precisely within the competence of Crown Agents.

“The pandemic was a great lesson for Uzbekistan, as well as for the whole world, because the challenges and problems that it created and the level of decisions that had to be taken during this period are of an unprecedented level,” R. Izamov noted.

As Brian Richmond emphasized, the statistics of Uzbekistan related to the pandemic, says that the country has coped with the problem. He expressed the hope that the experience shared by the British company would help to even more effectively respond to such emergencies.

He noted that the company is currently working with 45 countries, which provides a full range of supply chain services, helping to combat the coronavirus pandemic. “For all the time of my 45 years of work in this area, the current situation has turned out to be the most chaotic of all,” B. Richmond said.

The randomness, he said, is due to the fact that the situation with COVID-19 is different from other pandemics, in particular, the Ebola virus or SARS, which affected a number of countries. The global nature of COVID-19 has greatly affected the supply chain of medical goods and products. Most countries simultaneously wanted the same limited stocks of medical supplies. The list of such products includes personal protective equipment (PPE), equipment and consumables for testing, laboratory equipment, mechanical ventilation apparatus (IVL), oxygen equipment, pharmaceutical products, equipment for isolators. The company also had appeals to attract medical specialists from around the world, including nurses.

“We also conducted teleconference bridges using telemedicine and taught various medical protocols. All this intensively lasted three months of responding to the pandemic, and therefore there are lessons that we can share,” Richmond said.

So, what is necessary, according to the British company, for the efficient organization of supply chains during emergencies:

- the exact technical specification of everything that is requested, in particular, given that there is a whole range of masks, even medical workers sometimes do not use the masks that are needed, but first-line specialists must use masks together with protective overalls;

- when requesting test equipment, the customer must proceed from the capabilities of the used laboratory, and order test systems taking into account the appropriate test kits and reagents, otherwise an incorrect specification will lead to testing errors.

In addition, during the pandemic, there were many proposals from those who are trying to enter the market, taking advantage of the situation and the deficit that has arisen. To avoid low-quality supplies, the company uses the WHO specifications for product quality, and also checks manufacturers, their accreditation at the level of international standards, financial condition.

It is also important to monitor market changes, since during the pandemic period the price of disposable gloves increased on average by 4 times, tariffs for a number of air transportation - by 3 times, there were delays in the shipment of goods, as well as temporary export bans, which were specifically introduced in EU, USA, China.

One of the main lessons of COVID-19, according to B. Richmond, is that a pandemic is not just a crisis for public health, it is a social crisis and the state takes the main measures to get out of it.

COVID-19 showed that it is very important at the government level to develop in advance: practical measures to protect vulnerable segments of the population, including the elderly, contact tracking and testing strategies, the possibility of re-profiling capacities for the production of necessary products, incentive and protection strategies for the population.

In addition, it is important for the state to take measures to ensure that there are sufficient PPE reserves in the country for such situations, establish a system for continuing the remaining priority medical services, explain the importance of distance processes, including through communities, and involve the private sector in joint work on responding to a pandemic.

“An important lesson is also the understanding of international consolidation, since the states cannot cope with the pandemic alone, it is necessary to work together. Now the situation with COVID-19 is improving, but there may be a second wave, which again complicates the same supply chain. This is a global problem and we need to respond on a global scale,” Richmond said in his speech.

During the online conference, an active exchange of views took place, in particular, Bahrom Almatov explained to the British side the main aspects of organizing the supply chain of medical products in our country.

Among the many questions that the parties exchanged, a question was raised from the Embassy of Uzbekistan in the UK on the possibility of domestic manufacturers working with Crown Agents. As its head noted, there is certainly such an opportunity, and the company is always ready for proposals from the Uzbek side.