Bill Seeking to Increase Cebu Hospital Capacity to 100 Beds gets House Body Nod

A bill that seeks to increase the capacity of Mandaue City’s Eversley Child’s Sanitarium Hospital from 50 to 100 beds has been approved at the House committee on health.

House Bill 1545, authored by Cebu sixth district Representative Luis Gabriel Quisumbing, was once vetoed by President Benigno Aquino III during the 15th Congress but regained ground after the Cebuano legislator re-filed it at the House of Representatives.

Aquino vetoed the bill on account of a proposal to transfer the Vicente Sotto Memorial Medical Center (VSMMC) in Cebu City beside Eversley to accommodate additional patients and provide specialized medical services that the latter cannot perform.

Aquino said the proposed increase in bed capacity from 50 beds to 100 would be unnecessary and would only result in unjustified expenditures.

But a review of the planned VSMMC transfer and the ocular inspection conducted at the proposed site found out that the subject lot is currently encroached by a big manufacturing firm.

The results of the inspection prompted the Department of Health (DOH) to instead support the proposed increase in bed capacity of Eversley and the corresponding upgrade of the hospital’s service facilities and professional healthcare.

Quisumbing’s re-filed bill was approved following the endorsement of Health Secretary Janette Garin.

“We initiated this measure in the 15th Congress and re-filed it in the 16th Congress considering that the demand for affordable and accessible healthcare is on the rise,” Quisumbing said in a statement. (PNA) LAP/EB/RSM