Modern Spanish Town Hospital ‘augurs well’ for St Catherine – Dennis Robotham

“Spanish Town and St Catherine have always been on the back burner and as I have been saying St Catherine seem to be on the back burner for nearly every aspect of development [in terms] of roads, services, infrastructure,” said Robotham, who is the president of the St Catherine Chamber of Commerce and Industries.

“It means that this project at least shows that there is some interest in St Catherine and in the town and augurs well for the development of St Catherine. It therefore means that not only the medical services have now got to be on their A-game, the infrastructure, roads and all the other amenities need to be in tandem with the development that is taking place here.”

Robotham was speaking to Old Harbour News after the official opening of exhibits for the rehabilitation of the Spanish Town Hospital and other health facilities in the parish, namely the Greater Portmore, St Jago Park and Old Harbour health centres.

The exhibition was held at the Church of the Open Bible in Twickenham Park, Spanish Town on August 31, 2022.

The display provided stakeholders with a glimpse into the future of what the modernization plans will look like in 2025, the year the project is slated to complete.

When complete, the Spanish Town Hospital will be transformed into a modern six-storey health facility with increased operating theatres and offer an expansion of services such as computerized tomography (CT) scans, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), mammograms, urology, oncology, cardiology, ophthalmology, and psychiatry among others.

The 70-year-old facility, built in 1952, will be significantly enhanced with the addition of a new pharmacy, novel laboratory and radiology centres.

The expansion of the hospital and health centres will cost US$50 million, financed by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and will be the largest project carried out in the parish since independence, according to Robotham.

“We are looking forward that all the other stakeholders come on board and enhance the area. It means that jobs will be created, it means that the economy will be impacted positively so therefore it is not a little project, it’s a big project. Six billion dollars in anything is a lot of money,” said the businessman.

This, the chamber president argues, is “going to produce a demand for employment” and will trigger a ripple effect particularly for the economy of Spanish Town and the parish in general.

It is the most opportune time for the government to craft a master development plan for the nation’s first capital to meet this anticipated demand, he noted.

“It now means that the government has to look at the other aspects of building St Catherine and Spanish Town,” Robotham said. “We have the heritage sites, the only perfect Georgian Square in the Western hemisphere and we are not doing much with it. It means that the time has come and maybe this is a platform in which St Catherine and Spanish Town is about to take off. So we’re looking in that direction to see the productivity and moving to another level.”

It would appear that the government is already looking in that direction with talks of constructing a major public park for Spanish Town being mooted. While the business community is yet to be formally notified about such plans, Robotham says the idea will receive the full support of its membership.

Alluding to the need for more social amenities in Spanish Town, Robotham said: “I hear that the prime minister is about to launch green space in Jamaica and in St Catherine that is a commendable move.

“Although it is on the books that developers supposed to create green spaces, we don’t see it being happening in these areas. So we probably have to become more strident and we as the chamber will endeavor to push it another level.”