The total expenditure towards social, health and economic response efforts due to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, has exceeded MVR 3.3 billion.

Latest statistics publicized by the Ministry of Finance reveal that the total Covid-19 expenditure related to the health and social sectors sat at MVR 1,613.1 million by the beginning of the month whereas the total economic response expenditure reached MVR 1,715.3 million by then.

The government’s expenditure towards Covid-19 health and social response efforts saw a 0.1 percent increase between April 1 – April 8 in comparison to the previous week whereas the total disbursements made to Economic Response Package schemes saw a 1.4 percent increase during the review period.

During the review period, the ministry observed 42.8 percent of the expenses towards social and health response to have been committed spending and in terms of week-on-week expenditure, the Ministry of Health registered the highest spending under the government’s expenditure towards Covid-19 health and social response efforts.

Both the health ministry and Indhira Gandhi Memorial Hospital (IGMH) spent a majority of expense on medical consumables and operational services.

Since the health and social recovery efforts kicked off, the highest expenditure thus far has been registered by the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA), at MVR 867.9 million. The top contribution by NDMA was for supplies and requisites for service provision at MVR 362.7 million.

The second highest expenditure was registered by the health ministry, which has spent 449.8 million out of which 273.5 million was for travel expenses.

Indhira Gandhi Memorial Hospital (IGMH) spent 98.1 million overall by April 8, out of which 77.5 million was for supplies and requisites for service provision.

Out of the 67.6 million Maldives National Defense Force (MNDF) has spent so far on health and social response efforts since it began, 48.5 million was for employee wages as well as 15.9 million for supplies and requisites.

Throughout the response efforts, the Maldives Police Service (MPS) has spent a total of 31.1 million thus far.

MVR 37.3 million out of the total health and social expenses was from the Ministry of National Planning, Housing and Infrastructure. The Foreign Ministry also spent 6.8 million, and the Maldives Immigration, 900,000. Other contributors include the Ministry of Higher Education having spent 3.3 million, the Ministry of Tourism with 28.8 million in expenses and the Gender Ministry at 4.3 million in expenses.

Government institutions have thus far spent a total of 201.2 million for capital equipment as well as 193 million for operational services and 128.8 million for employee allowances.

Between April 1 – April 8, MVR 23.7 million was disbursed towards the Income Support Allowance Scheme. A total of 394.4 million has been disbursed as income support allowances thus far and businesses have received 946.9 million in funds under the ERP scheme. This includes 585.9 million disbursed through the Bank of Maldives for businesses and 361.3 million issued to Small and Medium Enterprises as well as freelancers, through the SME Development Finance Corporation (SDFC).