News that the Netherlands provided an extra US $7 million for St. Maarten General Hospital (SMGH) was welcomed by the Trust Fund’s Steering Committee (see Wednesday paper). It says this will allow the project to be completed without requiring cuts in other reconstruction programmes. Production and supply problems along with sharply increased prices for imported materials resulting from global developments made it necessary to renegotiate with contractor FINSO.
Also due to shipping issues, things seem to be moving rather slowly at the building site of late. However, when a letter of intent was recently signed on adjusting agreed-on terms, it had already been stated that the main activities would become more visible early next year.
Important is for the people to finally get their promised new state-of-the-art hospital without adding too much pressure on local public means that are scarce as it is, also considering the involvement of Social and Health Insurances SZV. As pointed out earlier in this column, apart from the exceptional current circumstances, budget overruns in similar ventures of a such a large magnitude are not unusual and occurred with Curaçao Medical Center (CMC) as well as Aruba’s Horacio Oduber Hospital (HOH).
This caused financial woes in both countries, so great care must be taken to prevent such a scenario here while keeping healthcare affordable. Strongly reducing the number of referrals abroad would be one way to do that.
The future opening of SMGH is significant not just for the island but also for neighbouring St. Eustatius and Saba. Fewer of their patients will need to travel huge distances for certain specialised treatments or procedures.
It’s high time to finish the job officially started six years ago. A lot has happened to spark delays since then, including hurricane-hits in September 2017 and the COVID-19 crisis.
Good things come to those who wait, they say. Let’s hope that holds true in this case, because it’s been long enough.
