The coronavirus crisis is first of all a public health emergency and the main role in managing this crisis should have be given to the Ministry of Health and medical specialists. But unfortunately in Moldova, but also in other states in this region, politics has prevailed. Politicians have exploited the crisis and interfered seeking political gains, stated Ala Tocarciuc, public health expert, during a public debate titled “Efficiency of COVID-19 crisis management in Moldova,” organized by the Association for Participatory Democracy ADEPT.
The expert thinks there really was no need to involve so many non-specialists in managing the crisis. “One conclusion would be that the regulations for crisis management did not specify a minimum rate of health professionals to manage a public health crisis. At least 30% or even half of the members of those commissions should have been health specialists. At the beginning, there wasn’t a single doctor (in the National Emergency Commission) and this fact caused frustrations within our society,” says Ala Tocarciuc.
Another aspect is the activity of Focal Points. According to the expert, in other countries where politics dominate over health considerations, politicians still consult specialists through collective intelligence platforms. And so the quality of the adopted decisions is less affected. Conversely, when specialists are not involved, this leads to bad solutions and bad results.
Ala Tocarciuc thinks the authorities have managed the crisis with different success in different periods of time. While some of the adopted measures deserve praise, their enforcement and monitoring leave much to be desired, says the expert.
The debate was conducted as part of ADEPT’s project "Keeping an eye on the authorities: managing the Coronavirus emergency and crisis", with the support of the Good Governance Department of the Soros Foundation Moldova.
