Bed crunch again at Tan Tock Seng Hospital?

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An honorable member of the Coffee Shop Has Just Posted the Following:

http://www.tremeritus.com/2015/08/22...seng-hospital/

Bed crunch again at Tan Tock Seng Hospital?


August 22nd, 2015 |
Author: Contributions





A photo which has been circulating in social media purportedly shows more than ten
beds cramped in a small area of what appears to be a hospital ward. Some beds
were placed just in front of another, seemingly to save space.

“World class health care at TTSH”, commented Gopi Bala, the person who first
posted the photo on his Facebook page.

Gopi said that the photo was taken on 18 August 2015 at about 2pm at Tan Tock
Seng Hospital (TTSH).

He shared that this photo was taken when his friend’s dad, who had dengue
fever, visited the hospital and had to wait there for some hours before finally
being warded at the Communicable Disease Centre (CDC).

Apparently, this was not an isolated incident.

One commenter, Chiang, who shared his views on Gopi’s post, said, “Happened
to my aunt 2 days ago. Not posting pictures because she doesn’t want to complain
about the gahmen. Just happy to have a corridor.”

Earlier
in January 2014, another similar photo was posted online. Patients were seen
housed in a makeshift tent and separated via partitions.

Changi General Hospital (CGH) was housing patients waiting for beds in the
large air-conditioned tent after the 800-bed CGH, along with Tan Tock Seng and
Khoo Teck Puat hospitals resorted to send patients to Alexandra, one of the few
public hospitals here with spare beds then.

Citizens were enraged by the photo, asking why was there a lack of beds for
patients and what measures are being taken to address the issue.

Health Minister Gan Kim Yong, who has been helming the Health Ministry since
2011, commented in January 2014 that he was aware of the problem and said it is
a reason for a push to add 1,900 more acute hospital beds and 2,600 community
hospital beds by 2020.

However, with the current situation as depicted by the recent photo, there
seems to be much more to done than just giving projections to relieve citizens’
worry on the hospital bed crunch.

In January, PAP MP for Tanjong Pagar GRC, Dr Chia Shi Lu, dismissed the bed
shortage, and ascribe it to the “holiday season”.

The Straits Times reported:


“Dr Chia Shi Lu, a member of the Government Parliamentary
Committee for Health, suggested that the crunch might be due to the holiday
season rather than a spike in illnesses.”
Read here: “Hospital bed crunch “due to holiday season”, says PAP
MP“.

Dr Chia later clarified his remarks and said that the bed crunch was “due to
several reasons.”

See here: “PAP MP clarifies remarks on bed
crunch“.

Terry
Xu

Source: The Online Citizen


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