The Tribune

PRIME Minister Hubert Ingraham toured the site of the new Critical Care Unit that is currently under construction at the Princess Margaret Hospital yesterday.

Noting that the unit is nearly 20 per cent complete, Mr Ingraham said that he and his government were pleased with the progress being made at the facility, as it is one that has been dreamed of for years.

According to the Public Hospital Authority, the project which started construction in November 2011 involves a 75,000 square-foot addition that will span three levels. When completed the new Critical Care Block at PMH will feature modern spaces, but still maintain the look and feel associated with Bahamian Family Island structures. The facility will consist of 18 recovery beds, 20 intensive care unit rooms, 48 neonatal intensive care beds, a new main entry and new laboratory facilities. The Critical Care Block will also offer doctors, nurses and other medical staff the space and equipment they need to deliver the best levels of care possible.

Mr Ingraham: "The Royal Bank of Canada has been helpful in providing a load of $55 million towards the project. The total project here is going to cost between $90 to $100 million dollars and the government will provide funding on top of the loan fund for the completion of the project. Of course we hope that we can strike a better balance in the Bahamas between public health and care facilities.

"We have been too focused in my view upon the institution and not as focused on the causes of the things that cause you to come here like obesity, like having a balanced meal, like exercising, like having clean drinking water, like washing their hands, like collecting garbage."

Mr Ingraham also added that he is disappointed that the nation has not arrived at the stage with respect to infant mortality numbers that should be expected in a country like the Bahamas. He said that it is his government's "hopeful expectation" that the focus will be brought to this area so that the Bahamas can have low, double digit infant mortality rates such as "10 or 11 or indeed get to the ultimate of single digit of nine one day not long from here."

"It is the poor of society that requires government intervention for public health matters, the wealthy and well-to-do are able to take care of themselves and so I've always been concerned with public health in the Bahamas in that regard. There was a major retreat from where we've gotten in 2002, major slippage took place from 2002 to 2007 this is not a political statement, this is a statement of fact. It's horrifying the neglect that took place in the five years I was out of office, unthinkably so," he said.

The last extension to the Princess Margaret Hospital took place in 1976.