COMING out of the Covid-19 pandemic, authorities here are building more hospitals to address the shortage of beds and staff in case there is a new health emergency in the future.
National Economic Development Authority-10 (Neda-10) Director Mylah Faye Cariño said the 600-bed St. Francis Hospital has already been constructed along Masterson Avenue in this city and the city government of Cagayan de Oro has also finished construction of a hospital in Barangay Lumbia here.
In neighboring Gingoog City, trader Arsenio Sebastian said the Polytechnic business group has started construction of a 100-bed capacity hospital that would complement a kidney center being planned by the local government.
Lanao del Norte Governor Imelda Quibranza-Dimaporo said they have already converted a Covid-19 testing center in Tubod town into a facility for infectious diseases.
Neda-10 and Northern Mindanao Regional Development Council (RDC-10) presented these developments during the launching of the Northern Mindanao Regional Development Plan 2023-2028 yesterday.
The plan is to build up the ratio of hospital bed capacity to one per 1,000 patients by 2028. Presently the bed-to-patient ratio in Region 10 is one bed to 2,328 patients.
Northern Mindanao is composed of nine cities ― Cagayan de Oro, El Salvador, Gingoog, Iligan, Malaybalay, Oroquieta, Ozamiz, Tangub, and Valencia — and five provinces namely Bukidnon, Camiguin, Lanao del Norte, Misamis Occidental, and Misamis Oriental
“Many of these hospitals are presently funded by private business but the government would be investing more,” Cariño said.
Ralph Paguio, vice president of Cagayan Electric Power and Light Company and business sector representative to RDC-10 said government should not be caught unprepared again where hospitals were teeming with record numbers of Neda-10-19 patients.
“A friend of mine who was infected with Neda-10-19 died inside his car unattended because the hospital was already full,” Paguio said.
Paguio said the Northern Mindanao Medical Center, Region 10’s main facility for Covid-19, overflowed with patients as smaller hospitals from the other cities and provinces send more of their cases.
Cagayan de Oro during the peak of the pandemic on July 7, 2022, had a cumulative 25,945 cases and 941 deaths since March 2020.
