University Hospital Location Still in Limbo  

The fate of the University Hospital is still undecided as cabinet deliberates where the building will be constructed. Last year, the Government of Belize signed a forty-five-million-dollar loan to build a hospital that would be operated by the University of Belize. However, the key stakeholders are not in agreement on where it should go. We asked the Minister of Health and Wellness, Kevin Bernard, about the progress of the deliberations. Here is his response.

 

Kevin Bernard, Minister of Health & Wellness

“As we have right now we had made a decision to revisit the location where we wanted to take the hospital initially. The land that we were air marking when the study was done, when the feasibility was done, they’re suggesting that you know what we needed to be close, one, to the airship because it will have a helipad. You need to be, you need to have access to the airship. If anything, you need to have a closer vicinity to the polyclinic that exists in the development facility area. And at the same time, the road access. We were looking at that. And It was taken to Cabinet. Cabinet said for us to go back to Ministry of Natural Resources, identify the proper adequate land in those areas. So the Ministry have been able to identify the land. So now it’s now where we have written back to the Office of the Prime Minister to say that we have identified these lands and this is where we were recommending. So we are at that stage. When we get that finalized, then you should be able to see the project kicking off hopefully by the end of this year.”