CLEFT patients in Cebu City will soon avail of free and quality medical service as Operation Smile’s Cebu cleft care center opens at the Cebu City Medical Center (CCMC) this Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024, nearly two years after the facility broke ground in Dec. 2022.
In a press conference on Monday, Sept. 23, Acting Cebu City Mayor Raymond Alvin Garcia announced the soft launching of the Cebu Comprehensive Cleft Care Center of Excellence. It will be on the seventh floor of the CCMC and will have a floor area of 1,700 square meters.
Under its partnership with the Cebu City Government, Operation Smile Philippines (OSP) will run the center; while the City Government will provide space at the hospital for free.
“We will actually be starting with cleft care operations and all other things related to that,” Garcia said.
The facility will have its grand opening on November 16 with special guests Operation Smile founder Dr. William Magee, Jr., and his wife, Kathleen Magee.
The center will have five operating tables, diagnosis, and medical evaluation facilities, feeding and nutrition care, dental care, speech services, counseling and support, and surgical care.
Operation Smile International has also partnered with Mariquita Salimbangon Yeung Charitable Foundation, Inc. (MSYCFI) for more than 25 years to provide free services.
CCMC completion
Meanwhile, Garcia disclosed that the bidding process for the completion of the new CCMC using the remaining P700 million in savings from the terminated P1 billion contract in 2022 is about
to begin.
He said the Bids and Awards Committee (BAC) has started sending out bidding invitations and he expects to receive potential bidders in the next 30 days.
Garcia assured that the winning bidder will be a qualified contractor.
On Aug. 15, City Councilor Mary Ann de los Santos, during an executive session, urged the deferment of the bidding process due to some questions on the scope of the civil works needed to complete the hospital.
The works to be bid out are intended to finish the fourth and fifth floors of the CCMC.
On the other hand, Garcia said a “tripartite agreement” for the completion of the CCMC’s eight to tenth floor would soon be submitted to the Cebu City Council
for approval.
The tripartite agreement will be between the Cebu City Government, the Cebu Medical Society (CMS), and
the contractor.
The CMS received at least P200 million in pledges from private donors, as part of the P1 billion pledge that followed the investment-seeking efforts of Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama in 2023. / EHP