Clare building company ordered Chinese ventilators at 75% more than average cost – EKO Integrated Services, an Ennis-based company, agreed to supply 100 VG70 ventilators from China to the HSE in early April of 2020 at a cost of €65,000 per unit. – 16 Sept 2021
The average price paid by the HSE per ventilator during the Covid procurement period was €37,100 per device, including those machines sourced from previously recognised supply lines.
Other suppliers delivering VG70 ventilators from China at the time ranged their units in price from €13,800 up to €54,933.
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Labour leader, Alan Kelly, contacted HSE to recommend Ennis company to provide PPE which earned EKO €87m – 7 Jan 2021
22 June 2020 – €102m paid to Ennis company by HSE for PPE during COVID-19 – Labor Party Leader, Alan Kelly, lobbied HSE on behalf of EKO for the contract.
- Payment to EKO was more than three times that issued to the next Irish based company by the HSE.
- Lennox Laboratories Ltd received €35.5m and
- Arco Safety Ltd received €32.4m.
- A total of €773m has been forked out by the HSE for PPE up until the middle of May 2020.
- The two largest sums have been given to overseas firm.
- China Resources Pharmaceutical has received €225.12m with
- Dobu Mask getting €102m.
- Aer Lingus have received €7.48m for transporting the PPE from China -14 flights (Etihad Airways? See below)
Eugene Keane is the CEO of EKO Integrated Service. A graduate of LIT, he is also the CEO of RGT Group which operates in the fields of renewable energy, property portfolio management and consultancy. The Clare man is primarily from a housing background. Situated at Áras Smith O’Brien, Bank Place, Ennis, company filings from 2018 detailed that EKO had net assets of €221,000. Eugene Keane. EKO’s CEO, is a former director of Keco Construction which had liabilities of €33.1m after it entered receivership in 2010.
Labour TD for Tipperary Alan Kelly has expressed his sincere gratitude to Chinese colleagues and contacts he has worked with in the past – Between April 14-22, EKO Integrated Services has organised three plane loads of masks and gowns flown into Dublin via Etihad Airways aided by Dr. Yupeng Liu, a lecturer at Technology University Dublin. EKO Integrated Services over the last six years has developed strong business links with China, and delivered a number of investment projects in Tipperary. – 28 April 2020
Kelly raises concerns around PPE availability – 2 April 2020
Kelly – Price controls on PPE and pharma products needed – (worried about the retail pricing, NOT the cost to the gvt of PPE etc, it’s ‘open season’ on that prey – 10 March 2020