00:00 With the last bit of concrete poured on the roof of the new central block of the Port
00:06 of Spain General Hospital, phase one of six is now complete.
00:15 Bringing the structure one step closer to final completion.
00:19 It's a 540 bed tower, 13 stories high.
00:24 The estimated cost at this point in time is 1.267 billion TT dollars, VAT inclusive.
00:33 So at this time we are within budget and we estimate that by March, April 2025, once we
00:44 have no unforeseen delays, this facility should be open to start to admit the first patients.
00:52 It's been a long journey to the new structure, with the sardifice being turned in 2018, after
00:58 the original edifice was deemed unsafe.
01:01 We've had to pull down the central block because it was engineeringly unsound.
01:07 I can say this morning that its structural replacement is engineeringly sound and we
01:14 are on our way to bring it into the family of health infrastructure that we have been
01:22 building across the country.
01:24 In November of 2021, the main contractor on the project, Shanghai Construction Group Limited,
01:31 terminated its contract with Udicot.
01:34 Local firm Universal Structures Limited has now completed the first package, while China
01:39 Railway will complete the remaining phases.
01:43 What pleases me very much is that having taken the approach that we have taken in going with
01:48 the six packages, once again as I did last two Saturdays ago, I must commend the local
01:55 contracting fraternity for coming to the party and rising to the occasion.
02:01 We always knew that if given the opportunity that you would do well and so far things are
02:07 going very well.
02:09 The new central block will be home to a range of services, many of which are not currently
02:14 offered at the hospital.
02:16 Everything, paediatric, psychiatry, medicine, surgery, cardiac surgery, interventional radiology,
02:23 we're bringing back psychiatry here for acute psychiatric admissions, alright?
02:27 Because the Ministry of Health has a plan for psychiatry otherwise, but people who come
02:31 in acutely, they would be admitted here.
02:34 So it's all that we're doing currently and we are increasing our services.
02:40 But health officials admit there is a shortage of specialist staff in the country.
02:46 A team is already at work training staff, but plans are also afoot to open a specialist
02:51 medical school in the new central block, in collaboration with the University of the West
02:57 Indies.
02:59 We already started with oncology from January 2024.
03:01 So we're not waiting for the building to be finished.
03:05 Because as I keep telling the population, the shortage is not with junior doctors.
03:10 The shortage is with specialists and subspecialists.
03:14 So we don't have paediatric cardiologists in the numbers that we want.
03:19 We don't have enough MRI specialists.
03:23 We don't have enough A&E nurses.
03:26 So the thrust is going to be to accelerate the development of specialists and subspecialists.
03:33 And we are already getting expressions of interest from partners outside of Trinidad
03:38 and Tobago, as they have heard of this, from England especially, to be a part of this project.
03:44 So it has ignited something very, very significant in the medical fraternity, not only here,
03:50 but abroad.
03:51 And while the health minister denies any mass exodus of nurses from the public health sector,
03:57 the medical director acknowledges that many of our brightest medical students reside abroad.
04:02 Who have done postgraduate work in England, UK, Australia, who are currently working there.
04:11 I am hoping we can encourage them back here.
04:14 It's time we get back our sons and daughters.
04:16 And this is the place to be.
04:18 Renessa Cutting, TV6 News.
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