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March 2021
INVESTIGATION
COVID-19 Drives Albanian Black Market Trade in Oxygen With COVID-19 putting an unprecedented strain on the Albanian health system, some COVID-19 patients and their families are turning to an unregulated and dangerous black market in oxygen, potentially doing more harm to their health than good. VLADIMIR KARAJ, ELTON QYNO, GERI EMIRI, VALBONA DAVIDHI | BIRN | TIRANA, DURRES AND FIERI
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ischarged from a Tirana hospital at the end of October following a battle with COVID-19, Elvira Dushku’s 71-year-old sister still has trouble breathing. So the family began calling around in search of supplementary oxygen equipment. They eventually found some, on hire for 9,000 leks, or 75 euros, per month, no small sum for an average family in Albania. They could have bought it for 900 euros, but, said Dushku, “We didn’t have that much money.” “This is a shameful business,” Dushku, 68, told BIRN. In Albania, COVID-19 and an overloaded health system have given rise to an informal, unregulated and dangerous market in supplementary oxygen equipment, to the concern of medical professionals. COVID-19 patients and their families have told BIRN of spending hundreds of euros, in some cases up to 1,500 euros, on oxygen equipment for home use. Some said they subsequently offered the equipment for sale on social media. “Both my parents were sick but I wasn’t able to find any to rent so I had to buy it,” said Dritan Selmani, a paramedic in the southern Albanian coastal region of Saranda. Having spent 1,000 euros, Selmani said he was now trying to sell the equipment on via Facebook. The sale of oxygen cylinders in Albania is strictly regulated by the law and limited to companies with permits to operate in the market. Experts, however, estimate that tens of thousands of items of uncertified equipment are
now circulating the black market, with no one regulating whether they are fit for use. Medical-grade oxygen is classified as a medicine, and as such should only be used with a prescription and in accordance with medical guidance. The National Agency of Medicines and Medical Equipment, AKBPM, is responsible for monitoring the quality of supplementary oxygen. The AKBPM did not respond to a request for comment. But Dr Krenar Lilaj, who works with COVID-19 patients at Tirana’s Mother Tereza University Hospital, said many patients arrived suffering from the effects of improper oxygen treatment at home. “Oxygen is a medicine,” Lilaj told
BIRN. “And as with any other medicine, if it is given in inadequate conditions and quantities it causes damage.” He acknowledged, however, that the demand created by the COVID-19 pandemic was enormous, and far outstripped the availability of specialists to monitor the situation. “Patients need specialised doctors,
Oxygen truck belonging to the company Messer Albagaz | Photo: Vladimir Karaj
but in this situation there aren’t enough specialists for all of them,” Lilaj said. Oxygen demand multiplies There have been more than 118,938 confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus in Albania since the start of the pandemic a year ago. According to the Health Ministry, there are currently some 34,000 active cases and 500 people in hospital with COVID-19. As of March 18, 2,092 people had died. A rise in cases over the past several months has triggered a similar demand for medical-grade oxygen. According to the two companies licenced to operate in the market – GTS and Messer Albagaz – demand from hospitals was up more than sixfold in January-February this year compared with the same period of last year, just before the pandemic struck. In total, the companies sold some 2.4 million litres during the first two months of this year, compared to some 382,000 litres a year ago. Both companies said they had difficulties meeting the demand given it had grown across the Balkan region, with Albania and its neighbours Montenegro and Kosovo reliant on imports of oxygen. A GTS representative, who declined
