TCU warned about fraud in the Popular Pharmacy Program; loss of R$ 2.5 billion

The Federal Audit Court (TCU) reported this Monday (15) that it has already acted in more than three hundred cases involving Farmácia Popular, a Federal Government program that promotes universal access to medicines at a low cost for the population.

The court’s announcement was made after the disclosure of new “frauds” committed by scammers who were using the Individual Taxpayer Registry (CPF) to register false requests for medicines. Between 2015 and 2020, the scheme caused a R$2.5 billion loss to public coffers.

According to the TCU, between 2017 and January 2022, 313 Special Account Takings (TCEs) were carried out involving the Popular Pharmacy Program. The value of the debt identified by the TCU was more than R$116 billion.

TCEs are administrative processes that determine responsibility for damages to the federal public administration, seeking to identify those responsible and guarantee compensation for the damage caused.

Last year, the TCU verified the implementation of suggestions made by control bodies to minimize the risk of fraud and misappropriation of public resources in the program.

Among the flaws found in the inspection, Minister Vital do Rêgo, rapporteur of the process, highlighted the weaknesses in the sales system which supports the management and monitoring of the program, in addition to the low assertiveness in identifying fraud.

At the time, the Court ordered the Secretariat of Science, Technology, Innovation and Strategic Inputs (SCTIE/MS) to carry out periodic monitoring of the program, with preventive and detective controls to avoid fraud.

In 2020, the court of accounts condemned 59 companies for irregularities in the Popular Pharmacy Program. The most common was the failure to prove the acquisition or existence of medication in stock. In total, pharmaceutical establishments were ordered to return R$15.5 million to the National Health Fund coffers.

The lack of invoices proving the acquisition of medicines that were registered in the system allows for the occurrence of fraud called “ghost sales”, a sales simulation that aims to generate undue payments by the Ministry of Health.

Other irregularities identified were the dispensing of medicines in the name of employees/persons responsible for the establishment and the registration of medicine dispensing in the name of deceased people.

At the end of last year, the Federal Police (PF) carried out an operation with the aim of dismantling a criminal association involved in fraud against the Brazilian Popular Pharmacy Program (PFPB). Two search and seizure warrants were executed at the residences of those investigated, located in the municipalities of Cariacica/ES and Luziânia/GO.

Through investigations by the PF, it was found that those investigated “bought” the CNPJs of at least four drugstores accredited to Farmácia Popular in Espírito Santo and changed their corporate structure using “oranges”. They then made thousands of fictitious insertions of medication dispensations into the system, causing a loss of at least R$1.15 million to the Union’s coffers.

In a note sent to the press, the Ministry of Health reported that it has already resumed the control and monitoring measures of the Popular Pharmacy Program, inactivating pharmacies that showed signs of irregularities.

*With information from Secom/TCU