When the pandemic started, Romania was not ready to deal with
\nsuch a major health crisis like the one triggered by the new coronavirus and
\nstate authorities have all admitted that. It took a great deal of conceptual
\nand logistical effort to keep the situation under control. An important role
\nwas to be played by Unifarm, the state-owned company that manages the purchase
\nof most medical supplies for hospitals in Romania. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
People found out on Tuesday
\nthat the company’s director, Adrian Ionel, was placed under judicial control by
\nanti-corruption prosecutors, on charges of bribery to award a contract for the procurement of surgical masks and protective overalls during the pandemic. The
\nsolicited amount allegedly stood at some 760,000 Euro. For this promised money,
\nIonel allegedly signed a contract for the purchase of 250,000 overalls and 3
\nmillion surgical masks with a Turkish company. Prosecutors accuse him of
\npersonally negotiating the terms of the contract with a person who was not the
\nofficial representative of the supplier company. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Moreover, the contract was allegedly awarded
\nin violation of all legal procedures in March, when the state of emergency had
\nnot been declared yet. When the first tranche of one million masks arrived,
\nthey were found to be non-compliant, and the Unifarm director unilaterally decided to terminate the contract. Anti-corruption prosecutors cannot say
\nwhether he did so because the masks were non-compliant or because the Turkish
\ncompany did not pay a single euro of the promised bribe.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Adrian Ionel claims he has evidence to support his innocence.
\nAs if that weren’t enough, the investigation revealed that, for almost four
\nyears, he had illegally held the position of General Manager of Unifarm, thus
\ncollecting salaries totaling almost half a million lei (over 100,000 thousand
\neuros). The control body of the Health Minister has been carrying out checks at
\nUnifarm, including with regard to the acquisitions made to fight the new virus.
\n<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
The still large number of daily cases is a serious test of
\nthe resilience of the medical system. The number of patients in intensive care
\nhas also increased slightly, and many hospitals are announcing that they no
\nlonger have spare beds and can no longer cope with hospital admissions. In order
\nto reduce the pressure on hospitals, the discharge criteria for the Covid-19 patients
\nhave been changed. Thus, the asymptomatic will be able to leave the hospital
\nafter ten days, under certain conditions. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Against this background, talks about a new stage of easing
\nrestrictions are increasingly anemic. Instead, there have been rumors of potentially
\nreinstating quarantine in the counties where the number of cases of infection
\nhas increased significantly. The Government says it is not considering such a
\nmeasure at the moment, but does not rule it out if there is a strong community
\nspread in a certain locality or neighborhood, said the Minister of Health,
\nNelu Tataru. (M.Ignatescu)<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A serious case of corruption shatters Romania at a time when the health crisis is far from being over<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":110,"featured_media":86178,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[37738],"tags":[40016,35393,35374,30375,35597],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-86177","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-today-in-the-news","tag-adrian-ionel","tag-bribe","tag-covid-19","tag-health","tag-unifarm"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n