A senior administrator at Papua New Guinea's Goroka base General Hospital has blamed the Department of Health for the major drug shortages facing most of the country's hospitals.
Peter Bire, acting chief executive officer at Goroka Hospital says the department is not pushing the government hard enough to act on its policy of putting health first.
He says many seriously ill patients are affected and all hospital patients disadvantaged to some degree.
Mr Bire said Goroka Hospital had been forced to make three purchases of essential medical drugs from private pharmacies in the town.
He said the prices of some drugs were ten times higher than other sources and some essential medicines were not available at the private pharmacies.
