Kerala Health Minister reviews development work progress at GMC Ernakulam, Cochin Cancer Centre

Minister George has mentioned that steps would be taken for removing the legal hurdles so that the construction work could be completed smoothly.

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As per the latest media report by The Hindu, in December last year, the Government had canceled the contractor's agreement as there was major delay in completing the construction work which began in 2018. Following this, the contractor had approached the Kerala High Court and the construction work came to a halt.

During the review visit on Tuesday the Health Minister has assured that the legal process would be expedited and she would consult Mr. Rajeeve for that. The daily further adds that the charge of construction has been given to a new contractor.

Meanwhile, as the medical college hospital was turned into a COVID-19 care centre last year, the cancer centre was transferred to the Ernakulam General Hospital. The operation theatres were also shut down for maintenance work four months ago. This had resulted in a situation where surgeries of non-COVID patients came to a halt.

The Health Minister has further informed on Tuesday that the functioning of the cancer center would be resumed by September second week and the operation theatres at the hospital would be functional from September 10 onwards. However, the operation theatres would be functional only after running safety tests.

Minister George also referred to the delay for constructing the mother-and-child super specialty block at the hospital which did cost around Rs 386 crore. She assured that the work would be resumed within two days and the payment issues involving the contractors would also be sorted out soon.

Mentioning that the target is to ensure that the block starts functioning by November next year, the Minister also mentioned that the construction of the sewage treatment plant would be completed before September 30.

Meanwhile, Mr. Rajeeve told the daily that the office of the Public Works Department would start operating at the hospital from next week. He also mentioned that the medical college hospital should have specialty wings in the trauma centre, neurosurgery, and urology.