Stalled works on the 400-bed Tema Regional Hospital and other health projects is expected to resume, as the government nears completion of its debt exchange programme in the coming months.
The €92 million facility started in 2020, is only 20 percent done as of last Friday, when the President’s representative at the Ministry of Health, Dr Benard Okoe Boye paid a working visit to the hospital.
It forms part of a 140-million-euro fund to upgrade and reconstruct some health facilities across the country, including the Central Medical Stores which was razed down by fire in 2015, the Nkoranza District Hospital and the Accident and Emergency Department of the Dormaa Hospital in the Bono region respectively.
Dr Okoe Boye expressed optimism that with the completion of the debt exchange programme, works on the project would resume in line with the government agenda to achieve universal health coverage (UHC) and quality healthcare delivery.
“These projects have been affected by the government’s debt restructuring but we hope to conclude discussions with the IMF towards recommencing works.
The Ministry of Finance is working hard to complete the exchange programme to ensure that creditors could start disbursement for these projects to either commence or be reactivated,” he stated.
Dr Okoe Boye, also the Minister of Health- designate, outlined his vision for the health sector to include providing a “down-to-top” approach leadership where issues affecting quality healthcare delivery are tackled at the basic level.
“We are also interested in building systems and that’s why the government is investing a lot into digitization particularly in data and records keeping, the roll out of the e-health and telemedicine platforms allowing patients to consult with doctors remotely.”
Touching on “Agenda 111”, Dr Okoe Boye indicated that the projects were on course and “from reports obtained from the project managers, appreciable numbers of these facilities will be completed by the end of this year.”
The Director-General of the Ghana Health Service (GHS), Dr Patrick Kuma-Aboagye, noted that the essence of health infrastructure was to improve access to care and reduce waiting time.
In view of this, he said the Service was working at improving the primary level of care to reduce disease progression and ease burden at the tertiary level of healthcare across the country.
Dr Kuma-Aboagye said to resolve the brain drain the health sector, the Service was recruiting 200 doctors into the system this month as it works on generally boosting human resource capacity.
The Principal Consultant at CSENG Consult, Mr Abraham Fiscion, briefing the entourage on the projects pointed out that the main contractor for all four projects under the 140-million-euro facility pulled out in October last year due to the economic crisis.
However, he disclosed that foundation and structural works at the Tema General Hospital had been completed while similar works had been done in the case of the Dormaa Hospital and the Central Medical stores.
BY ABIGAIL ANNOH
