Another DOH irregularity uncovered

The perceptive public, and this columnist too, was not surprised at all when Vice President Jojo Binay backed out of the debate with Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV set for Nov. 27 which he himself had asked for.

When his spokespersons started telling the public that there was nothing to be gained from the debate, it was a signal that Binay would back out.

The public had eagerly waited the debate because it wanted to hear what Binay had to say about the accusations of corruption and ill-gotten wealth hurled against him.

Binay, who projected a swashbuckling image of Rambo (a movie character played by Sylvester Stallone who fought his enemies single-handedly), obviously got cold feet and refused to face Trillanes.

The debate would have been one-sided in favor of the Vice President.

Binay is a lawyer—a University of the Philippines College of Law graduate at that—who is honed in courtroom arguments.

Trillanes, a former military officer whose only claim to fame is taking part in the Oakwood Mutiny, would have been a pygmy to Binay, the legal giant, in that debate.

But no matter good Binay is in argumentation, the truth will come out during the debate.

Binay has refused to refute claims aired in the Senate that he and his family plundered the coffers of the Makati city government since they took over in 1986.

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I nearly fell off my chair when I read that Binay had laughed off claims that his political career was over, as a result of continuing stories on his alleged amassing of wealth through illegal means.

Binay said he would win in the 2016 presidential election because he still had a very wide margin over possible presidential candidates.

“I keep a wide lead in surveys. Never in history has someone led the race by a wide margin,” Binay told reporters.

What can we say. The guy may be diminutive in size but he has an ego as big as Makati City Hall Building 2.

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The Vice President wrote this columnist a letter denying what I wrote in this column on Oct. 18—that he had asked President Noynoy to stop the Senate investigation into the gross overpricing in the construction of Makati City Hall Building 2 when he was the city mayor.

“I hope that in the future you would use ‘little birdies’ that are more reliable,” said Binay in his letter.

The guy can lie through his teeth. The President himself confirmed my claim in an interview with reporters.

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Another irregularity in the Department of Health has been uncovered.

Health Secretary Enrique Ona is facing an investigation conducted by the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) over his alleged approval of the purchase of antipneumonia vaccines for children worth P833 million against the recommendation of the World Health Organization (WHO).

Ona allegedly rammed down the throats of government doctors his approval of the untested vaccines.

The newly uncovered irregularity concerns the tests on a malaria drug in Rizal, Palawan province, which allegedly resulted in the death of a malaria patient.

Ona reportedly ordered the test of the antimalaria drug without the approval of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

As a result of the death suspected to have been caused by the antimalaria drug, the FDA formed a special team to investigate the case.

The FDA probe team recommended that the Department of Health stop ongoing tests on the drug in Subic town and Olongapo City in Zambales province immediately.

The NBI should also investigate the drug trial in Palawan that allegedly caused the death of a malaria patient.