EDITOR’S NOTE: In our last edition, #InfrastruCaribe started a two-part series on healthcare Infrastructure in the Caribbean. In this newsletter, we conclude that series even as we continue our series on social infrastructure in the Caribbean, which started last week in edition 2021-05-07. Two countries are covered, namely: Jamaica and Guyana.
Our headline, taken from the Jamaica Gleaner, reads: “US Gov’t-Funded Mobile Field Hospital Finds New Home In Spanish Town”. The mobile field hospital, provided by the US Southern Command to Jamaica in September 2020, has now been erected on the grounds of the Spanish Town Hospital in St Catherine.
A second US-funded mobile field hospital arrived in Jamaica early in April, and a third — also from the US Southern Command — will arrive in months. Otherwise, the Canadian Government, through the Canada Fund for Local Initiatives, has provided CAD $100,000 to Jamaica’s Ministry of Health and Wellness to procure 48 hospital beds for its field hospitals.
Meanwhile, Guyana’s Minister of Health — Dr. Frank Anthony — has commissioned the Diamond Diagnostic Centre, which was recently upgraded to a ‘Smart Hospital’. And finally, the Dr. Leslie Persaud Medical Diagnostic Centre Lab has been certified by the Guyana National Bureau of Standards (GNBS).