After several years under construction, the Baucau Referral Hospital has started to operating in a limited capacity, but still does not have adequate equipment.
National MP Francisco da Costa said the building had been completed, but its interior was still empty.
“Patient registration is being done in the new office, but treatment [services] and medication are in the old hospital,” he told National Parliament.
Patients must also walk a long distance between the new and hospitals for treatment, he said.
Although the new hospital is not fully complete, he said health personnel are using the facility to register patients because the old one is too small.
Construction on the Baucau Referral Hospital started in 2007, but stopped later that year. In 2010 then government restarted construction and awarded the new contract to international company Ensul to carry on the project.
Meanwhile, in September 2016, the company officially handed over the hospital’s office to the government through the ministries of Health and Public Works.
The budget for the construction of the new hospital was more than $8 million.
In response to the issue, Health Minister, Maria do Ceu Sarmento Pina da Costa said health personnel used the new office for patient consultations, but did not hospitalize patients there.
“The equipment is in the process of being imported and when the installation is complete we will inaugurate [the hospital],” she said.
However, she would not disclose the name of the company that won the tender to import the equipment and do the fit-out, but said some of the equipment was already being installed.
As a new hospital, the minister said a big investment was needed in terms of medical equipment.
