EDITORIAL - We needed this last year

Yesterday’s deadline for the contractor as well as the management of the new Cebu City Medical Center to start operations in the first three floors came and went, but still nothing.

Earlier, acting Mayor Mike Rama threatened to have the contract with the construction firm terminated if they did not meet his deadline.

“Trabahuon nila. I have talked to the contractor. They have to do their job or I will have their contract terminated... I'm very serious. We mean business. We walk the talk,” the acting mayor said in an earlier report.

However, according to CCMC administrator Yvonne Cania, the deadline could not be met because the interior works are still ongoing.

“We have to take into consideration the health and safety of the people, especially now that we are facing a respiratory problem,” she said, adding that it might be done by the end of August.

We recognize that this time of the pandemic is not an easy time to finish anything, especially a huge government project. The restrictions and lockdowns are making everything from sourcing the needed materials to making sure there is always an adequate workforce difficult for contractors and companies, both big and small.

But if the contractor and the hospital management can get that place up and running by the end of the month, or even sooner, this would be good for all of us.

A new CCMC was something we needed last year yet, considering how many people needed hospital treatment for one reason or another.

Even as the patients of COVID-19 pile up, there is still no shortage of people who need treatment for non-coronavirus ailments. Normal life, with the illnesses, sickness, diseases, and accidents it brings, still went on alongside the pandemic.

And while people can use the expanded facilities of the complex currently being designed as the CCMC right across the street from the new one, it has its limitations because it was not originally designed as a hospital and was not built to be permanent or long-term.

This should be a teachable moment for the parties involved here. For contractors that they should try as much as possible to stick to what was agreed on or face the consequences, and for the city government that they should know whom to hire to finish something on time.