Cotabato City—Members of the Bangsamoro Parliament joined hands in efforts to upgrade the 105-year-old Sulu Provincial Hospital, one of the country’s oldest existing hospitals.
Bangsamoro Transition Authority Parliament Bill No. 90 seeks to upgrade the Sulu Provincial Hospital to Level II from Level I hospital category. The proposed measure is authored by the lawyer brother of Governor Abdusakur Tan of Sulu.
Bangsamoro Parliament Deputy Speaker Nabil Tan of Sulu and Deputy Speaker Omar Yasser Sema of Maguindanao author BTA-PB 90. This Bill is co-authored by Deputy Majority Floor Leaders Khadafeh Mangudadatu of Maguindanao and Paisalin Tago of Lanao del Sur,
Sulu Provincial Hospital serves the health and medical needs of 900,000 people in the province’s 11 municipalities. The hospital was established on November 5, 1916 as a project of the colonial setup of the Department of Mindanao and Sulu.
Members of Parliament Amilbahar Mawallil and Jose Lorena, and Speaker Ali Pangalian Balindong, are also co-authors.
Once passed into law, the hospital’s bed capacity will increase to 200, and its professional healthcare services and facilities will improve by authorizing the hiring of additional medical personnel.
The hospital does not have an Intensive Care Unit (ICU), making it difficult for hospital staff to attend to patients needing critical care.
Under the bill’s Section 3, the Bangsamoro Government shall provide the necessary funds to increase the hospital’s bed capacity, as well as the corresponding upgrading of its facilities and services.
Tan said the hospital is severely under-staffed due to lack of a significant number of plantilla positions.
Also, Section 2 of the bill provides that the Ministry of Health, in coordination with the Ministry of Finance, Budget and Management and the Civil Service Commission, shall determine the titles and salary-grades of additional positions needed for the upgrading. New positions will be filled up in coordination with the Sulu Provincial Hospital administration.
The same BTA Parliament members also filed another bill which seeks to establish a 100-bed Level II General Hospital in Maimbung, Sulu.
The authors said this will ensure that the residents of Maimbung and its neighboring communities are provided with immediate and more effective access to healthcare services since Maimbung is far from Sulu Provincial Hospital in Jolo capital.
Once approved, the authors said the new hospital can serve patients coming from the island municipalities of Tapul, Para, Lugus, and Pandami which are more geographically accessible to Maimbung than to Jolo.
“It is the mandate of the Bangsamoro Government to establish, by law, a general hospital system to serve the health requirements of its people and ensure that the individual basic right to life shall be attainable through the prompt intervention of excellent and affordable medical services,” said Deputy Speaker Tan in his sponsorship speech on BTA’s session last week.
“Let us bear in mind that we are building a nation and building a nation starts with the protection of our valuable resource – which is the human resources. If we have weak citizens, unhealthy citizens, the dream of building a strong nation will remain a dream,” Tan pointed out.