The long-delayed RM90 million renovation works on the federal government acquired Sabah Medical Centre (SMC) premises in Kota Kinabalu appears to have finally started. The contractor, it is learnt, plans to work round-the-clock.

                

Health Minister Liow Tiong Lai’s ticking off the contractor during his visit late last month for the delay seems to be having some effect.

State Health director Dr Mohd Yusof Ibrahim said renovation works on the SMC premises cover two unoccupied floors, a floor for the doctor’s lounge, an extra elevator and one additional Accident & Emergency treatment room.

The SMC premises, renamed Queen Elizabeth General Hospital II, will have 455 beds and a cardiac centre.

“We are also building a five-storey car park in the area to ease traffic congestion,” said Mohd Yusof. “I have briefed the chief minister on the progress of works and he’s happy. The renovation will be completed by March next year.”

The privately-owned SMC was acquired by the Health Ministry for RM280 million after the eight-storey Queen Elizabeth General Hospital in the city, built in 1981, was declared unsafe in July 2008 and decanted three months later.

queen elizabeth hospital kota kinabalu 251008 Demolition works have also begun on the decanted general hospital (GH) tower block ( right ). The old site will have a new RM300 million tower block which will be called Queen Elizabeth General Hospital 1.

Construction is also scheduled to begin on a new 10-storey 600-bed twin tower block next to the old GH tower block after the demolition works on the site are completed.

No general hospital for two years

The delay in turning the SMC into a GH-type facility and the various snags on the other projects has not come with a price in a city without a general hospital since October 2008.

The general complaint is that patients are even being placed in holding rooms, city patients are being directed to district hospitals and a VIP who came in for knee surgery was sent to Sandakan.

A source in the State Health Department (SHD) disclosed that that there is a backlog of more than 1,000 elective surgeries. The patients have been waiting for six months to a year. The plan is to fly in surgical teams in various disciplines from Kuala Lumpur to operate at the Beaufort and Papar Hospitals.

The seriousness of the public healthcare situation in Sabah is underlined by the fact that at the time of its decanting, the general hospital in KK had a massive workforce of 2,400 including specialists, doctors, nurses and other categories, according to SHD figures.

They had to be shifted to the SMC and distributed among other facilities at a time when the GH was the sole referral hospital in the state providing inpatient service, emergency service and specialist service.

In addition, according to the SHD, 40 percent of the posts in government hospitals and clinics in Sabah are now vacant. Some of these will be filled when 59 doctors from Peninsular Malaysia are dispatched to Sabah in stages.

“About 20 have already arrived and are now serving in the various health clinics and hospitals throughout Sabah,” confirmed Mohd Yusof. “The target is to have six doctors per district hospital compared with the present three.”

Liow put under pressure

The Sabah Progressive Party (Sapp), which is monitoring the GH issue in Kota Kinabalu, has publicly warned Liow that it will hold him personally responsible if the public healthcare situation in the state doesn’t turn around soon.

Sapp information chief Chong Pit Fah has been quoted as saying in the local media that “Liow should step down gracefully as the health minister and apologise to the people of Sabah” if the public healthcare situation in the state continues to deteriorate.

With its hands full in Kota Kinabalu for the moment, it is learnt that the Health Ministry has decided not get involved in state government’s plans to turn the abandoned Wisma Khidmat in the city into a RM100 million teaching hospital for the Universiti Malaysia Sabah (UMS).

It is not known whether the Higher Education Ministry and the Health Ministry, besides UMS, will go along with the state government’s plans for Wisma Khidmat.

“To build a hospital is easy but not to run and maintain it,” said the SHD source. “The country was already short of manpower and running a hospital would be a very expensive investment.”