The Davis administration will, very soon, launch an emergency medical ground transport system in the Family Islands, Minister of Health and Wellness Dr. Michael Darville said yesterday.
“I intend to launch it very soon, and this will transform ground transportation throughout the country,” he said during the launch of the Public Hospitals Authority’s Trained Clinical Nurses program.
“The days will soon be gone when our loved ones in the Family Islands through their loved ones on the back of a truck and take them to the airport where they can get air transport.
“We are going to implement an emergency medical transport system, ground transport system, across the archipelago.
“I am so pleased that finally the procurement process to purchase all these
ambulances that will be deployed throughout the Family Islands is near completion after 22 months.
“A lot is going on in healthcare.”
Residents on the Family Islands have longed complained about the lack of ambulances on their islands.
Nurses
The health minister said that 40 nurses recruited from the Philippines and Africa will take up their posts.
“We are recruiting,” he said.
“As the US recruit from us, we need to recruit from somewhere – so there are Ghanaian nurses, we have Filipino nurses coming to help us with our short-term plan. Of course, that is only short term.
“The way how we resolve our medium and long-term plan is through training local Bahamians to fill these spaces that currently exist.”
Darville noted that the US has recruited heavily in The Bahamas and other countries.
Developed countries are recruiting from developing countries to meet their demand, he said.
Darville said yesterday that shortly after the Davis administration came to office in 2021, it conducted an analysis of the gaps that currently exist in the system with nurses.
Darville said, “We found out that throughout the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, we were short by 173 to 180 specialty nurses. We were almost short by almost 450 nurses.
“So, we were having severe challenges providing services, not only at tertiary healthcare facilities but through our healthcare facilities throughout the archipelago.”
