Government Greenlights New Hospital for Belize City, Construction Expected to Begin Soon

The Government has announced plans to construct a brand new hospital for Belize City.  Minister of Health and Wellness, Kevin Bernard, confirmed that the Cabinet has given its approval and that construction can expect to begin shortly.  Love News understands that there are still some I’s to dot and T’s to cross prior to the physical work, including consultations with the Central American Bank for Economic Integration (CABEI).  CABEI is the agency that had conducted a comprehensive study on the functionality and the infrastructure of the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital.  

Kevin Bernard, Minister of Health and Wellness: “When we got CABEI to do the studies across the country, and let me say that while KHMH is one, there are other studies that are being done for the Northern Region, for the Punta Gorda Hospital, and so KHMH was being looked at as well a complete study was done for KHMH, and based on the recommendations it is recommended that a new tertiary hospital is built for the Belize District. We are looking at whether we use the same location or we find another location within the city that will be adequate enough, accessible enough as well, coming from the north, coming from the west. We are looking at an option on the Chetumal Street or the Lake I Boulevard. There’s a huge area next to the new treasury building that we can utilize as a hospital. Again, what we are saying is that when we build these facilities now we want to ensure that the quality of services are also embedded in these constructions because you want to ensure that these investments last a long time. KhMH has served its time. In fact, the building, sometimes you would want to go in there and make improvements but it’s going to be a waste of investment so it’s best to start to look at what is being done. I know we have worked with the KHMH authority through support from BTB and the ministry. We have invested in the A&E room, I know they did a huge investment in terms of improving. So that’s not to say that KHMH will go away. This is just for us to provide a better facility for the Belizean people to access.”

Minister Bernard explained that in addition to the construction of a new facility, the government is also looking at ways to make health care more affordable and accessible for residents.

Kevin Bernard, Minister of Health and Wellness: “As you know, KHMA right now is the only hospital in the Belize district apart from our polyclinics and so Matron Roberts and others that provide secondary care also. And so we are looking at other options in terms of how can we make secondary care services more accessible to the Belizean people. I don’t want to divulge that information yet but we’re looking at similar what we did with the other region hospitals where we remove secondary fees and so forth but we have to have a complete discussion with KHMH and to see how that will benefit the Belize district residents. But KHMH, yes, so cabinet, what has happened is that the feasibility study has been completed, now we go back to CABEI for them to complete the plans and say alright this is what we’re going to do. So they will then give us the final decision in terms of do we go to the new facility or do we construct where we have identified the space at the current facility. But again, like I said, this is big news for our country. It’s about improving the level of services. As you know, KHMH has been providing a lot of great service to the Belizeans. We have one of the best ICU wards. We have the cardiac program that is now being done. So all these things we have to look at.”

The Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital was constructed in September 1995.  Before the KHMH, there was the Old Belize City Hospital that was located on Eve Street