By Angeline Valencia | January 16, 2010 9:00 p.m.

Garcia Memorial Provincial Hospital in Talibon can now qualify for elevation to tertiary hospital after the Department of Health, the provincial government and Malacañang equipped it with a P5-million out-patient department building.

Health Usec. Elmer Punzalan inaugurated this afternoon the P5-million OPD building that houses the diabetes, under five, surgery and ENT, ophthalmology, obstetrics and gynecology, family planning, internal medicine, psychiatry, animal bite, and dental clinics. The laboratory occupies a big part of the building.

The new building, funded under Governor Erico Aumentado’s convergency strategy and the Kilos Asenso initiative of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, also includes a wellness center and offices of visiting consultants.

Aumentado and Usec. Punzalan unveiled the building’s marker after the ribbon-cutting and blessing ceremonies that preceded the turn-over of the symbolic key from the project contractor, Ricomar to DOH, then to the provincial government- -represented by the governor and Vice-Governor Julius Caesar Herrera, then to GMPH Chief of Hospital Dr. Harold Gallego.

Chiefs of other government hospitals in the province also attended the event to show and solicit the same support from DOH and the provincial government. They joined Dr. Portia Reyes, DOH-7 representative in the province.

In his message, Punzalan said the health facility serves as “clear manifestation of the continued cooperation among the leaders in health, the local government executives, the Center for Health Development in the region, and the people of Bohol”.

“We all know that one of DOH’s vision of health reforms in our country is to overcome the challenges of unfair and inequitable access to health care to our people,” Punzalan cited.

On this, he said the different sectors in the community need to continue the partnership and collaborative efforts among themselves “to guarantee a more sustained, accessible and affordable quality health care to all, especially the poor”.

The undersecretary also lauded Aumentado’s convergence strategy as an effective formula “to strengthen the hospital’s effective and efficient delivery of services”.

He also commended Boholanos for the many accomplishments that made them deserving of DOH’s full support in all the present and future projects.

“Through the years, GMPH has truly evolved, continuously grown and expanded with changing time, making innovative and collaborative efforts to source out funds just to deliver the best health services to patients.

Aumentado, for his part announced that he had signed on January 11, an addendum to the Memorandum of Agreement he signed in November last year with PhilHealth president Rey Aquino for the implementation of the universal coverage of 17,000 to 20,000 indigent Boholanos.

In the addendum, it is stated that the provincial government shall enroll qualified barangay officials- -barangay captains, kagawads, secretaries, treasurers, tanods, barangay health and day care workers under the coverage of PhilHealth. There are 30,000 of them in the entire province, making the provincial government’s beneficiaries in this program about 50,000 in all.

Aumentado said he will submit tomorrow, a request for a supplemental budget to fund this program. But for the meantime, initial payment of the premiums for beneficiaries in the second district- -where officials had already complied with the requirements to support its implementation, shall be sourced from the Provincial Development Initiative Fund (PDIF) of the governor.

The addendum also provides that “payment of premium for renewal of coverage shall then be subsequently provided as a regular part of the annual budget of the province.

This is also in addition to the health support fund of P100,000 for each of the province-run hospitals to serve as source of fund for the financial assistance to their indigent patients.

Aumentado also said the provincial government works on the upgrading of the government hospitals in the province to convince the people to patronize their services.

In the case of GMPH, he said the patients from Talibon and the nearby towns need not travel to Tagbilaran City as quality health services are already available in their area.

In addition to the pharmacy building and other facilities, the new OPD building, Aumentado said can contribute a lot in aspiring for the elevation of GMPH to a tertiary hospital

The governor also mentioned that improving the facilities of GMPH can complement economic growth of Talibon with the entry of major industrial establishment- -the US$100-million bio-ethanol processing plant that the Korean government’s Biolsystems Co. will construct in its 100-hectare special economic zone.

This is in consideration that investors are keen on the availability efficient health services.

While the Metro Tagbilaran area serves as the hub for tourist, and educational centers, the northeastern basin of Bohol is designed for for agriculture and eco-tourism development.

He said in the northern corridor, talibon is the heart and center of development thrust, to host two major industrial projects that could help develop Bohol into the center of green power technology as enunciated in the recent summit in Korea he and the President had an opportunity to attend.

The Korean government will also put up in the special economic zone, a research and development center for red algae, to be funded through a grant of US$2.9-million by the Korean government through KOICA. It will be run by DOST.

Moreover, Finnish investors also proposed to put up a jatropha biodiesel facility in the special economic zone.

Aumentado said the economic activities in Talibon, as the center, would expand to Ubay and to the Tubigon in the north.

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