Five 200-bed children's hospitals that have stood unused since their construction was finished, for want of staff and equipment, will open by the end of this year. The prime minister is expected to inaugurate them together from Dhaka in November or December.
Dr S M Ziauddin Haider, the prime minister's special assistant on health with the rank of state minister, gave the news to journalists after visiting Rajshahi Medical College Hospital on Saturday, 31 October. He said new posts for the hospitals' staff had been created and purchases of equipment and furniture were in their final stage. Rajshahi's children's hospital is one of the five.
Rajshahi Medical College Hospital was upgraded from 550 to 1,200 beds in 2013, he said, but its staff, buildings and equipment were never increased to match, so it still effectively runs at 550-bed capacity. It has now been decided to provide 1,200 general beds and a 100-bed intensive care unit; a project will upgrade it and seven other older medical college hospitals, and its expansion will start late this year.
Noting that the Padma brings many snakes to the Rajshahi region and many snakebite patients to the hospital, he said antivenom would be supplied very soon.
Asked about a contractor's faulty lifts in the ICU building, hospital director Brigadier General P K M Masud-ul-Islam said an investigation had found the lifts supplied in 2023 were not up to standard, and the ministry was taking action.
Reporting: Barta24 staff correspondent, Rajshahi.
Photo: Nahid.rajbd / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Source: Barta24
Comments
(0)