KwaZulu-Natal will be investing in nine new clinics and two community health centres (CHC), with construction plans already being finalised and building likely to start by August.
Tabling the provincial health budget in the KZN legislature last week, Health MEC Nomagugu Simelane said one of the CHCs will be in eThekwini, to cater for the Mbumbulu community and surrounding areas, and the second will be in the Mtubatuba municipality.
The new buildings were in addition to plans to upgrade four rural district facilities: Vryheid, Dundee, Bethesda and Christ the King hospitals.
The upgrade plans were announced three years ago, but were derailed by the pandemic, reports News24.
However, the projects are back on track and the condition assessments on all four hospitals were completed in October, Simelane added.
The upgrade will see beds at Bethesda Hospital increase from 200 to 300, and from 210 to 300 at Christ the King Hospital. Dundee Hospital will receive an extra 66 beds, bringing the total to 270 beds, and Vryheid Hospital's beds will increase from 338 to 540. In addition, the provincial Health Department will upgrade the eDumbe CHC to a district hospital this year.
Plans to build a tertiary hospital in the north of the province were also “gathering momentum”, she said.
The provincial department will also be investing in energy alternatives at healthcare centres.
“These will be determined by the energy demand, as well as the rate of utilisation in that facility. In clinics without generators, we'll be sourcing inverters and solar panels. In hospitals, we'll be using a hybrid system involving generators, inverters and solar panels.”
The department has received an incentive grant from the national government of more than R78m, Simelane said, for its infrastructure development score.
See more from MedicalBrief archives:
KZN Health’s turnaround plan labelled an ‘attack on lives’
Special directorate will examine every KZN medical negligence claim
Durban hospital failures are just newspaper ‘sensationalism’ — KZN Health