Ask. The PP denounces that a position from the Balearic Health Institute sent an email to another colleague just two days after the merchandise arrived suggesting that it was defective and could not be used in hospitals. What exactly were they referring to?
Answer. The order contains the following description: 118618 FFP2 KN95 FACIAL PROTECTION MASK FOR HOME USE with a different code than the masks for use within healthcare facilities.
There is, therefore, no recognition of defective material two days after receiving it, but rather a clarification about who the masks were intended for, according to this response.
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P. How many certificates are signed at the end of the year to prove that a supplier company satisfactorily fulfills its mission? When the famous certificate was signed in favor of Management Solutions, did the officials have in mind that they had received a report from the Ministry of Labor laboratories stating that they did not comply with the requirements for FPP2 masks?
R. On August 12, 2020, a certificate of technical solvency of the company SOLUCIONES DE GESTIÓN was signed, certifying that the company has supplied protective clothing during the 2020 financial year in the amount of €3,701,500. As reflected in said certificate, no mention is made of FFP2 masks but rather of protective clothing and said certificate is signed because that was the case, the company delivered KN95 masks for said quantity and said amount as agreed with the Administration and there was no evidence that The masks did not comply with KN95, as the Chinese Government’s certifying bodies had indicated. Please note: the rest of the receiving administrations used them, we sent them for analysis. The GB2626 standard is in principle applied by the manufacturer himself in a self-certification process under his own responsibility and market surveillance is what acts where appropriate. When the Administration requests certificates of good execution to prove technical solvency in a public contract, as established in article 90 of the Public Sector Contracts Law, it usually requests a minimum of three, so the company, in addition to the certificate of the Ibsalut had to present certificates from other administrations, and in no case was a single certificate sufficient to prove solvency. In an entity the size of the Health Service, more than a hundred type certificates of this nature can be signed annually.
P. Before formalizing the purchase from Management Solutions, what type of analysis is carried out in the health service to approve the acquisition?
R. We cannot ignore the context of the period in question and the enormous urgency that existed at that time in searching for and making available protective material. On April 25, 2020, the documentation was sent to the technicians, so that they could rule on whether the material complied. They determined that, based on the documentation, they complied with Chinese regulations; complied with GB2626/2006; the supplier made a declaration of conformity; They sent a quality audit. At that time, Ibsalut was providing surgical masks to other administrations, colleges of pharmacists, nursing homes… Consumption was increasing and it was not known if it would have to be provided to civil society as well. Furthermore, there was a more than reasonable doubt that instead of using surgical techniques, the use of KN95 / FFP2 was beginning to be extended or imposed outside the healthcare field. For all these reasons, a specific code is created within the SAP for citizen use, not in-hospital use, that is, a mask for out-of-hospital use.
P. What was the reason for storing the masks when the report from the Ministry of Labor laboratories was received and giving the order that they not be distributed? Was there any intention to use them at another time? Is it because they were going to demand the money back and in exchange they were going to deliver those masks to the Management Solutions company?
R. In the following years, the pandemic continued and Ibsalut managed to supply enough masks and did not have to resort to the KN95 purchased from MANAGEMENT SOLUTIONS, since the stock that it was decided to maintain during the pandemic was 400% of the stock of security. At that time, the fear of experiencing a situation similar to 2020 again, the different variants of the virus that were emerging, as well as the waves that were occurring, did not indicate that the end of the pandemic could come. What may seem disproportionate now, at that time, seemed the most logical and ideal way to serve health professionals and the population. In addition, there was a requirement, on the part of the Ministry of Health, to store them and maintain all the material to access the de-escalation and until the end of the pandemic.
P. Why do you decide to claim only 2.6 million, assuming therefore that you keep the masks as surgical masks, did you plan to use them once the claim is resolved? And if so, wouldn’t they have already expired and be unusable?
R. The partial claim process is that these masks did not serve as FFP2, but, by remaining KN95, they could serve for civilian use. The economic comparison of the claim is to make an estimate of the amount of the same comparatively and economically to the most comparable mask in market price, such as the surgical mask.
P. How do you explain the delay of three years in claiming the money back? What is the reason for such a long delay? Does the Balearic health service have any similar claim that has taken so long to process?
R. That Ibsalut had not requested the masks during that time does not mean that it did not analyze how to address the file, once the end of the pandemic had arrived, but quite the opposite. The technical doubts about the KN95 masks, which also passed the controls and audits of the Chinese Government and the legal questions about how to proceed with them, delayed the start of the file for several reasons. The masks purchased and delivered corresponded to KN95 and not FFP2, and the analysis had been carried out on FFP2 filtration parameters. At a legal level, resolving a file that had been processed as an emergency raised many doubts. At all times, the statute of limitations of the file was kept in mind, to begin the proceedings before the statute of limitations occurred. Regarding the question of similar claims, they are very complex claims to which the regulations give a limitation period depending on the applicable regulations and the Administration always takes the limitation period into account in all its actions.
P. At the end of May 2020, the Health service decides to send 25 samples of masks. Of those, only four correspond to the Management Solutions lot. Of the 21 remaining samples, in 12 of them the Labor laboratory says: “Does not comply.” Did they return them to the suppliers, did they initiate a claim process such as that of Management Solutions?
R. The CNMP report is a cumulative analysis report that lists all the masks that have been sent for analysis, both those purchased and donated, and samples.
P. The officials of the Balearic Health Service received some political indication from their bosses to buy Management Solutions and during the next three years someone told them to turn a blind eye to that contract?
R. From the management side, no one has ever received any pressure of any kind, neither before, during nor after the purchase or claim. Neither for this nor for any other provider or file.
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