Johoreans are breathing a sigh of relief that the Unity Government is resolving the numerous issues at the Sultanah Aminah Hospital (HSA).
The RM500 million allocation announced by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim for the first phase of infrastructure development covering a new block and multi-level carpark has been long-awaited by the people.
Civil servant, Salmah Yunos, 49, who is suffering from hypertension and receives treatment from HSA, said she usually has to wait for half an hour to get a parking spot.
She said that if she is unlucky, she sometimes has to park at the shoplots about a kilometre away and walk to the hospital.
“I have to circle the area many times to get a spot and sometimes there is none at all. It is risky to park by the roadside as we will be issued a summons.
“So when the Prime Minister announced the allocation, I was relieved. People have been waiting a long time for this good news,” she told Bernama.
Petrol station supervisor, Abdul Rashid Hamzah, 43, who regularly takes his diabetic mother for treatment at the hospital, said Anwar’s concern for the well-being of the people should be praised.
He said the decades-old hospital definitely needs a new block and hoped the government would sustain its efforts to upgrade the hospital.
“We know government hospitals treat large volumes of patients and are crowded, so the new block can reduce the overcrowding. The healthcare sector also needs to keep up with the nation’s fast-paced development, especially in Johor, which is becoming more advanced (than other states),” he said.
M.Shobana, 54, who frequents HSA for treatment and regular check-ups since she was diagnosed with diabetes three years ago, said she was grateful that Anwar and Johor Menteri Besar Datuk Onn Hafiz Ghazi are attending to the people’s hardship.
“I am a patient at HSA and always have appointments for my treatment. This is a great effort to ease the burden of people like me who depend on government hospitals,” she said.
Johor Health and Unity Committee chairman Ling Tian Soon said he hoped HSA’s issues could be resolved with the completion of the new block and carpark.
“Among the issues, we (state government) raised with the Prime Minister during his visit, were the lack of parking, overcrowding at the polyclinicnic, and the shortage of hospital beds,” he said.
Anwar, who visited HSA on Aug 3 with Health Minister Dr Zaliha Mustafa and Onn Hafiz, said phase-one of the project involving the multi-level carpark will be implemented immediately, and construction should be started this year.
Based on HSA’s website, the hospital was built in 1938 to replace the earliest district hospital established in 1882.
HSA is currently one of the busiest hospitals in the nation, handling an estimated 2,134 outpatients and 460 emergency patients daily.
Source: BERNAMA News Agency