A P100 million worth of Center for Emerging and Re-emerging Infectious Diseases (Cemreid) extension building will soon rise at the Teresita L. Jalandoni Provincial Hospital (TLJP) in Silay City, Negros Occidental.

Negros Occidental Governor Eugenio Jose Lacson and Third District Rep. Jose Francisco Benitez led its groundbreaking yesterday, September 13, together with Silay City Mayor Mark Andrew Golez and other local officials.

Lacson said the project is funded by the provincial government and the Department of Health Facilities Enhancement Program through the Office of Senator Christopher Lawrence “Bong” Go, chairman of the Senate health committee.

The Covid-19 pandemic, as a global health crisis, has stretched our health system beyond their capacity and exposed the weaknesses of health systems worldwide.

Responding to this public health emergency and minimizing its impact require every health resource to be maximized, Lacson said in his speech.

He cited that when TLJPH admitted the first Covid patient, the hospital had six isolation rooms and when cases went up, triage and another consultation area had to be set up outside the emergency room to segregate patients according to risk assessments.

Patients were examined in tents outside the main Emergency Room (ER), Lacson said.

Consequently, the doctors, together with the present administration, seriously considered the idea to set up another ER where patients can be examined and treated in relative comfort and in an optimum set-up to protect both patients and health care workers.

"With the lives of millions, including that of the Negrenses, endangered, we need to make unprecedented steps," Lacson said, adding that "at present, two of our hospitals were assigned as Covid hospitals, disabling them to cater to non- Covid cases and emergencies thus, the birth of this center."

With this, the province's healthcare system will be able to serve both clean and infectious cases simultaneously but separately as the Cemreid wing will have its own ER and Intensive Care Unit (ICU) among other facilities aside from isolation rooms, the governor added. (TDE)