P1.5 Billion Medicines Wasted In Philippines, Marcos' Health Secretary Facing Charges

2026-04-02 02:29:22

(MENAFN- Khaleej Times) The Philippine health secretary is facing fresh charges over P1.5 billion (Dh93 million) worth of expired medicines.

A 33-page complaint was filed with the country's Office of the Ombudsman by a group that identified themselves as“concerned Department of Health (DoH) personnel,” accusing Dr. Teodoro Herbosa and 16 other officials of graft and of serious dishonesty.

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Their complaint alleges the health chief allowed the medicines to become“dead stock” in a warehouse, instead of being distributed to regional health units.

Along with the secretary, 16 other officials are being accused of“grave misconduct and conduct prejudicial to public service.”

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The petitioners are seeking preventive suspension of the respondents to prevent further alleged abuse of authority.

They said they have filed their petition anonymously“for fear of reprisals.”

The agency's national inventory report published in January revealed expired tuberculosis and measles vaccines in its warehouses, aside from P1.3 billion worth of other vaccines.

Earlier in February, the Herbosa-led DOH was accused of“wasting” a total of 240,000 ampoules of psychiatric injectables worth P24 million.

In defense of the agency, DOH spokesperson Albert Domingo said last month that“the truth is far from what anonymous groups can easily allege without accountability.”

Conscious indifference

But the complainants underscored the concerned DOH officials“received formal, written warnings of the magnitude of the impending loss,” but are refusing to do anything about it.

The whistleblowers said that the respondent officials could have ordered the distribution of nearly-expiry medicines but instead chose to hurriedly dispose those to“hide the evidence from media scrutiny.” They cited internal communications from Herbosa's office, with one message purportedly saying:“If the media finds out about this, we're dead.”

The complaint added:“The respondents did not merely commit a clerical error; they demonstrated a 'conscious indifference to consequences' by allowing P1.5 billion in resources to transition from life-saving medicine into 'dead stock.'”

“Their conduct proves that they viewed the P1.5 billion in taxpayer-funded medicine as a political liability to be buried and hidden as they did in the past,” it said.

Badly-needed

There are currently 117.5 million Filipinos who are part of an economy controlled by a handful of billionaires. Family planning medicines in the Philippines are supposed to rein in population increase and address badly-needed maternal and child health issues.

The government guarantees easy access to voluntary contraception to reduce unintended pregnancies and support family well-being under the Responsible Parenthood and Reproductive Health Law of 2012 – a hard-fought measure against decades of spirited opposition by the influential local Roman Catholic Church.

Since the law took effect, the population growth rate in the Philippines has significantly slowed, decreasing from approximately 1.63 per cent from 2015–2020 to roughly 0.80–0.83 per cent annually between 2020 and 2024. Still, there is a significant unmet need for contraception among young Filipinos between the ages of 15 to 19 years old, mostly from poor and marginalised communities.

The wastage of billions of pesos worth of medicines is feared to derail the progress.

The country also reported an upsurge in cases of mental health issues since the Covid-19, which the wastage is making worse. A Cambridge University study revealed that Filipino adults suffered severe anxiety (13.84 per cent), moderately severe depression (21.73 per cent) and severe depression (9.08 per cent) between 2020 and 2022.