After 11 years, new King Abdullah blocks still incomplete

Slow funding by Saudi government delays completion of hospital project

MANSEHRA: Members of the King Abdullah Teaching Hospital (KATH) Health Management Board have decided to approach the Saudi ambassador to expedite release of funds to complete a long-delayed project at the hospital.

The board met in Mansehra on Thursday with the area’s Deputy Commissioner Iqbal Hassnain – who is also the board’s chairman – District Nazim Sardar Said Ghulam, District Health Officer Dr Shehzad and Frontier Medical College Chief Executive Dr AJ Khan in attendance.



Briefing the meeting about progress made on the hospital’s reconstruction – which ahd been destroyed in the 2005 earthquake, KATH Medical Superintendent Dr Javed said that due to the unsatisfactory and slow pace of construction, the Saudi government (the financier for the reconstruction since 2005) had cancelled the contract given to a private firm.

But over a month after the cancelling the contract, the superintendent said that no new contractor had been engaged to complete construction of blocks three and four of the hospital, which consisted of all the wards.

He added that KATH serves as a central point for Kohistan, Torghar and Battagram districts. But with construction of the blocks yet to be completed, there are currently limited beds for inpatients. This leads to problems for patients and hospital, Dr Javed said, adding that the hospital remains incomplete even 11 years after the devastating Kashmir earthquake.

Providing details on the number of patients tended to at the hospital this year, Dr Javed said that January to October 2016, KATH had received 499,565 patients. Of these 20,000 were inpatients, while 1,166 were referred to the Ayub Teaching Hospital for tertiary care.

The MS told the meeting that the hospital was administering rabies vaccine free-of-cost to dog bite victims at a cost of Rs2.2 million during the first ten months of this year.



About future plans for upgrading the hospital, he said that they were working on building a a new emergency block, install heating and cooling systems, computerised OPD chit system, ensuring availability of potable water for patients and installation of a state-of-the art x-ray machine.

After reviewing the reports, board members also decided to schedule a meeting with the Saudi ambassador under the leadership of Federal Minister for Religious Affairs Sardar Muhammad Yusuf, and urge the envoy to expedite the disbursement of Rs250 million to the hospital so that work on the two blocks, which has been delayed, could be completed.

The meeting also approved other upgrades to hospital facilities.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 3^rd, 2016.