Largest Pharmacy Network in Latin America Inaugurated in the Capitol

Dominican President Leonel Fernández, inaugurated the People’s Pharmacy Network which offers service to some four million people each month. The inauguration took place in the Francisco Moscoso Puello Hospital in the northern zone of the capitol.

The Pharmacy Network has 424 modern establishments that function according to pharmaceutical criteria all around the country. The total cost of the project is in excess of 125 million pesos.

The Pharmacy Network has 424 modern establishments that function according to pharmaceutical criteria all around the country. The total cost of the project is in excess of 125 million pesos.

After the cutting of the ceremonial ribbon, President Fernández toured the various installations of the Moscoso Puello Hospital, accompanied by hospital authorities. He viewed a demonstration on how the medicines will be distributed, according t a press release from the President’s Office of Information, Press and Publicity.

The construction, stocking and administration of the People’s Pharmacy Network was carried out by the government through the Essential Medicine Program & the Center for Logistical Support (PROMESE/CAL in Spanish).

The main speech of the event was given by Elena Fernández, Director of PROMESE/CAL. She stressed that the RD$125,933,737.52 investment in the People’s Pharmacy Network project was meant to benefit citizens with low incomes.

Elena Fernández noted that the Pharmacy Network inaugurated by the President is the largest in Latin America.

She added that the Network is in the first phase of a project that will reach all corners of the country so that all of those in need can have access to reasonably priced medicine.

The project, she explained, provides monthly coverage of up to four million people with a guarantee of quality that the medicine and other pharmaceutical products are of high quality in which users can have total confidence.

Welcoming remarks were given by Dr. Roberto Lafontaine, Director of the Moscoso Puello Hospital who said the Network was an example of strengthening democracy because it takes into account the country’s poor. He said it also demonstrates President Fernández’s enormous human qualities.

In the name of the users of the service, community leader Bienvenido Molina, thanked the Dominican President for the project that will benefit a large majority of people in the country as well as the city.

Monsignor Agripino Núñez Collado blessed the project and the building. He lauded the effort of the President and the Dominican Public Health authorities for setting up the Pharmacy Network.

The inaugural act was attended by various officials and individuals including Presidential Secretaries and Health Officials, Doctors César Pina Toribio and Bautista Rojas Gómez; the hostess Elena Fernández; Dr Roberto Lafontaine, Mrs. Marta de Alburquerque, Monsignor Núñez Collado and Dr. Cristina Nogueira, representative of the Pan American Health Organization, all of whom sat together at the main table.