The original article can be found in: Trinidad Newsday By RICHARDSON DHALAI
PRIME MINISTER Kamla Persad-Bissessar yesterday said her People’s Partnership (PP) coalition government will be remembered for building hospitals and schools and not for the tall buildings, which among other things, many remember the previous PNM administration for.
She made this bold declaration at a tour of the long awaited San Fernando Teaching Hospital, in the building that was formerly known as the Chancery Lane Administration Complex.
Prime Minister Persad-Bissessar beamed with pride during the tour which boasts facilities for 216 in-patient beds, which she said would go a very long way in easing the burden and regular bed shortage at the nearby, decades old San Fernando General Hospital (SFGH).
“When I became Prime Minister, many doctors spoke to me saying, ‘why don’t we convert this facility into a hospital institution which would bring so much relief to those who really need it?’
“This is a flagship project for the People’s Partnership administration,” Persad-Bissessar said.
“My administration, my Government will not be marked by high-rise buildings, but will be one that will be people centred, that will be one where we build hospitals, it will be one where we build schools, it will be one where we put down the infrastructure needed to open up the entire country,” the Prime Minister asserted.
Addressing an audience which included senior doctors, Health Minister Dr Fuad Khan, chairman of the South-Western Regional Health Authority (SWRHA) Dr Lackram Bodoe, UWI St Augustine campus Principal Professor Clement Sankat and Cabinet members, she said that a main feature of the spanking new facility is a concrete and steel walkway linking it to the SFGH.
“There were concerns that we should have kept this as a commercial space, that we should open up a car park. We need all those things but you cannot enjoy any of that if you are ill or dead,” she said, adding, “it’s critical this hospital, in the same way we had some differences of opinion in the opening of a new highway which would open up the entire south west penisula, and that too is critical.”
“I don’t think anybody understands how long it takes a person to get from Point Fortin to San Fernando to reach this hospital. How long it takes them to get to Port-of-Spain. And even if they do know, perhaps some of them do not care,” she said referring to those opposed to construction of the Point Fortin to San Fernando Highway.Persad-Bissessar said the new hospital would serve two main purposes — provide better health care and to be used as a teaching facility. “The teaching aspect will be married with our newly opened facility in El Dorado and that facility will be for training over 2,000 nurses. We will commission that facility early in the new year,” Persad-Bissessar said.
Persad-Bissessar, in a wide ranging address gave glimpses of her Government’s plans for 2013 saying development of the economy, job creation and fighting crime remain priority issues.
And with the THA election less than a month away, Persad-Bissessar noted that two bills relating to Tobago — the Tobago Constitution Amendment Bill and Tobago House of Assembly Amendment Bill — will be laid in the House of Representatives next year.
“In the new year in Parliament, I will be laying through the relevant offices, the Tobago Constitution Amendment Bill and Tobago House of Assembly Amendment Bill. The Attorney General (Anand Ramlogan) advised me yesterday that both are complete and all stations are ready to go for debate,” Persad-Bissessar said.
Dr Khan said the next step for the teaching hospital would be sourcing medical staff including radiologists and nurses over the next few weeks.
He projected an April deadline for the first intake of patients at the facility.
He said it cost approximately $1.8 billion to convert and outfit the building into a modern hospital facility in line with strict international health codes including Seismic Resistance, deep piling for earthquake resistance, the American Institute of Architects Guideline for Health Facilities, the US National Fire Protection Association, Healthcare Facilities Codes as well as US OSHA standards. Khan said the $1.8 billion, was money well spent as the purpose for this expenditure was the saving of lives.Giving an insight into how complex a task the converting of the administrative complex into a hospital was, Housing Minister Dr Roodal Moonilal — who is line minister for the Urban Development Corporation (Udecott) which was responsible for the transformation — said:
“The X-Ray Room required precise, meticulous wall to wall construction, with the floor and ceilings layered in thick slabs of lead and other construction treatment for protection against and containment of radiation. The experts were there to ensure all proper protocols were administered with these installations.”
He said when the commissioning is completed by April, the hospital would be the first delivered to the nation in a generation. “You need only look at the space-constraints at the aged San Fernando General Hospital next door, built 58 years ago, to understand the daily hardship citizens face with limited public health care in San Fernando,” he said.
“I am happy to say that the new San Fernando Teaching Hospital with its 216 in-patient beds will deliver to the people of San Fernando and its environs, a catchment of 600,000 citizens, 21st Century health care,” Moonilal said. Other features of the hospital would be Lecture Halls, Seminar Rooms, Laboratories, Conference Rooms and Assimilated Ward Workshop Areas.
