Kurmitola General Hospital Inaugurated

The Daily Star, May 14, 2012

Serve properly to make hospitals effective, PM urges doctors

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina inaugurates the 500-bed Kurmitola General Hospital at Dhaka Cantonment yesterday. 

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina yesterday said the masses will not benefit from hospitals if the attending doctors and staff fail to provide their respective services properly.

“Hospitals are just a physical infrastructure. It is the responsibility of the doctors and the healthcare service providers there to make hospitals effective,” she said while inaugurating the 500-bed Kurmitola General Hospital at Dhaka Cantonment.

Hasina asked all concerned to perform their respective duties properly to ensure that the masses can avail the required services on time. She said healthcare is a basic and constitutional right of the people and her government has been implementing various programmes to reach healthcare services to the doorsteps of the common people.

The prime minister announced that the number of physicians, nurses and other healthcare service providers will be increased, as required in the government hospitals and health centres, to ensure better treatment. She directed the health minister to take necessary steps to establish a “Nurses’ Training Institute” on the campus of the Kurmitola General Hospital to impart appropriate training to nurses.

She said the Dhaka, Salimullah and Suhrawardy medical college hospitals cater for the needs of the residents of the middle and southern part of the capital. With the inauguration of the Kurmitola General Hospital, opportunities of healthcare services for the huge number of people residing in the northern part of greater Dhaka has been created, she added.“From now on they will no longer need to go to the southern part of the capital for treatment,” she said. Hasina said she laid the foundation stone of the Armed Forces Medical College in 1998 and a full-fledged hospital was needed for the students of this college. Kurmitola General Hospital will play a vital role in building efficient, modern, time-befitting and professional physicians for the country, she said.

A process is underway to upgrade the 31-bed upazila hospitals to 50 beds while 206 such hospitals have already undergone the transformation. New buildings were constructed in 42 healthcare institutions including medical college hospitals and district hospitals, she said.

Besides, she said, the district hospitals will be upgraded to 250-bed hospitals in phases while the government established four new public medical colleges across the country. 

Earlier, the prime minister also inaugurated another 100-bed hospital named “Siraj-Khaleda Memorial Cantonment Board General Hospital”, constructed by Siraj-Khaleda Trust, at the cantonment. Health and Family Welfare Minister Dr AFM Ruhal Haque, the prime minister’s Health Adviser Prof Sayed Modasser Ali, Chief of Army Staff General M Abdul Mubeen and Health Secretary Humayun Kabir also spoke on the occasion.