Work to Get Under Way Shortly at Cornwall Regional Hospital

Minister of Health, Dr. the Hon. Christopher Tufton, reports that work to rectify the ventilation problem at the Cornwall Regional Hospital is to get under way shortly.

He said the Ministry has received bids to provide design work, and these will be considered over the next week.

“The provider of the service will be selected, at which point they will be given a week or two to mobilise, and then we go into the work,” Dr. Tufton said.

He informed that the Ministry has received the report from the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) regarding contamination issues at the hospital.

Dr. Tufton, who was speaking to journalists at a function to officially hand over the expanded Brown’s Hall Primary School in St. Catherine on Wednesday (April 12), said he is pleased with the pace at which things are moving.

“We are doing further relocation, and it is going well,” he noted.

Operations at the main building of the hospital have been scaled down to facilitate cleaning and renovation, while safeguarding the health of staff and patients.

Many of the services have been relocated to temporary facilities on the hospital compound and nearby locations in recent weeks. The Ministry has also moved some clinical services to neighbouring hospitals.

Expansion of the Brown’s Hall Primary School was undertaken at a cost of $49 million and included the addition of 12 new classrooms, a multipurpose court, kitchen and tuck shop, paved driveway, disability access ramps, and erection of a new perimeter fence.

The project, financed by the Jamaica Social Investment Fund (JSIF), has created much-needed space for the more than 350 students at the institution.