Deyalsingh: More capacity for PoS hospital

HEALTH Minister Terrence Deyalsingh hopes Cabinet will soon approve a proposal to additional capacity in Port of Spain and St James, to relieve pressure that Port of Spain General Hospital (PoSGH) has been under since being decanted in September.

The decanting happened after the August 24 earthquake which affected the hospital’s central block. “I have a note before Cabinet to seek funding to re-purpose existing buildings in Port of Spain and St James to rebuild capacity while the new central block is being built," Deyalsingh told reporters at PoSGH yesterday.

The construction of the new central block is expected to take two to three years. Deyalsingh hoped Cabinet will approve the note in early January. Saying the Couva Children and Adult Hospital should never have been built before central block was fixed, Deyalsingh said the former Patrick Manning and Kamla Persad-Bissessar administrations failed to act from 2009 to 2015 on reports which called for central block to be rebuilt.

Under the incumbent Dr Keith Rowley administration, Deyalsingh said this is now a top priority.” Before the earthquake Cabinet approved the construction of a 540 bed tower,” he said.

Explaining this project will be done in two phases, Deyalsingh said phase one involves clearing out the site where the new block is to be built. “ To clear out the site, you have to build new structures for the departments that are there. That has begun, that will take about a year,” he said.

Once that is done, Deyalsingh continued, departments in the central block can be moved to the new buildings, the old buildings will be demolished and construction of the new central block can start.

While that plan was approved and is underway, he said the earthquake complicated matters and central block had to be decanted. Deyalsingh said decanting central block was “was not on the cards because we did not foresee an earthquake.” With PosGH not at 100 capacity, Deyalsingh said the Urban Development Corporation of TT has gone out for sole selective tender, regarding construction of the new central block.

Deyalsingh said construction of the new Arima and Pt Fortin hospitals should finish in May. He said both hospitals should be operational by September.

Deyalsingh also said the Couva Children and Adult Hospital should come online sometime next year.

In April, the Prime Minister said Government, the University of the West Indies and Interhealth Canada are working out a public private partnership that will turn the hospital into an offshore medical school. The hospital was opened but never commissioned under Persad-Bissessar's government.