World Bank approves loan worth 52.5 million euros for Moldova as response to pandemic

Chisinau, 25 April /MOLDPRES/ - The World Bank on 24 April approved a loan worth 52.5 million euros from resources of the International Development Association (IDA), provided to Moldova for an emergency response operation to COVID-19. The project will support efficient and opportune actions of response to the COVIED-19 pandemic, through strengthening the national medical assistance system and attenuation of social risks.    

Focused on improving the health sector’s capacity of prevention and emergency response to COVID-19, the project will also provide social protection measures for the poorest and most vulnerable categories of residents, in order to manage the immediate impact of the pandemic.

“The World Bank Banca speeds up the support provided to Moldova and its people to counteract the spread of COVID-19,’’ World Bank’s Country Manager for Moldova Anna Akhalkatsi said. ‘’The financing will consolidate the country’s capacity to detect and monitor the infection and to save lives. The project will also provide resources for extending the coverage with social assistance of the poor and vulnerable categories.’’    

In the context of the efforts to improve the detection and prevention of the spread of COVID-19, the project will purchase urgently necessary consumables, including equipment, consumables for diagnosing for the national laboratories, personal protection equipment, protection materials against infections for the staff from hospitals and primary medical units, medical equipments, medicines and consumables for the intensive therapy units and ambulances. The project will train the medical staff in providing assistance for COVID-19 and preventing the infection and will back the strengthening of the medical personnel’s capacity to provide critical assistance. 

Additionally, the project will develop the capacity of the Health, Labour and Social Protection Ministry to approach challenges in the case of appearance of hotbeds of infectious diseases and diseases preventable by vaccines, as well as to efficiently respond to eventual similar challenges.

Last but not least, the project will support the expansion of the principal anti-poverty programme in Moldova, Social Assistance, as well as the introduction of important changes in the programme’s design. The changes will result in increased support for the worst hit groups, priority representing the families with children. This will further prompt strengthening of the efficiency of the Social Assistance programme in solving the challenges related to COVID-19. 

The project’s beneficiaries will be people already hit by COVID-19, citizens exposed to enhanced risk, especially the elderly people and those with chronic diseases, the medical and emergency staff, providers of services to the medical and testing centres, as well as the public health agencies involved in the response to the crisis. The workers and families hit by the pandemic, by losing their jobs or losing other incomes, will be better protected through extending the coverage of the governmental programme, Social Assistance.