EDITORIAL - Funding is the only problem

The question is not really about the location. It is about the immediate realization of the effort to construct the new Cebu City hospital.  

City Councilor Mary Ann Delos Santos said the construction of the new Cebu City Medical Center will still be at its present site along Natalio Bacalso Avenue. This extinguished the plan of Mayor Michael Rama to relocate the CCMC to the South Road Properties.

Under the Department of Health policy, Delos Santos said, no government hospital will be constructed near bodies of water.  So the SRP, a piece of land developed out of the city sea, is definitely out of contention for the site of the new hospital. 

As much as the city government would want to transfer the CCMC to the reclaimed land, the existing DOH guidelines say a hospital should not be constructed near the sea, rivers or other bodies of water to make it safe from disasters.

Now the city is forced to renege on its plan. And there's no longer any other option except for the present location of the city hospital. So it now boils down to the question as to when will the plan for the new hospital materialize.

Since the present CCMC is unfit for occupancy following the powerful earthquake in October, building a new one has become urgent. But the problem is that the city is having financial problems for its construction.

In fact, it wanted the public to help fund the building of the hospital, putting up water containers in strategic areas for its "Piso Mo, Hospital Ko" campaign. City officials cannot deny the fact that a new CCMC is very much needed as it is the only medical facility that caters to the city's poor.

So when will the city government start with the construction of the new hospital? We do not know yet. The only thing that prevents it from pushing through with the project's immediate construction is the funding.