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Don't take safety for granted

28 OCTOBER 2016 @ 11:00 AM
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SOME government hospitals in the country are old. The Kuala Lumpur
Hospital, for example, was rst developed in 1870 as a district hospital
with just three wards, but has been gradually upgraded and expanded.
Taiping Hospital was built in 1880. On the east coast, the Kota Baru
Hospital began operations in the 1920s with two wards, an European
Ward and another for the locals, but a new building began operations in
1938. Malaccas hospital, meanwhile, was built in the 1930s. Even
University Hospital (now University Malaya Medical Centre), Malaysias
rst teaching hospital, is almost 50 years old. Granted, all of them have
expanded to meet growing needs and modernised to keep pace with
developments in medical science, but the fatal re in Johor Barus Sultanah
Aminah Hospital (HSA) raises questions as to the standards of safety
maintenance in government hospitals.
The HSA recently razed by re causing the death of six intensive care
unit (ICU) patients on ventilators and injuring several staff members, with
one of them currently in critical condition rst started as a district
hospital in 1882, its modern building was operationalised in 1938, which
makes the hospital itself well over 100 years old. Like other government
hospitals, it, too, has undergone several phases of expansion and
modernisation. The latest re scare a day after the ICU disaster, triggered
by water seeping into a socket that caused sparks, was a false alarm, but if
there had been a short circuit, there could have been another re. How this

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Don'ttakesafetyforgranted|NewStraitsTimes|MalaysiaGeneralBusinessSportsandLifestyleNews

is possible when there should be regular inspections and maintenance by

the Public Works Department (PWD), the body responsible, is puzzling.
Were they negligent?
Or, could it be possible that modernisation work, though regular, thus
improving the healthcare services provided, did not take into account the
upgrading of electrical infrastructure of the older buildings? The dearth of
information necessarily causes speculation, but some conclusions can be
drawn from the few statements made by those responsible. Indeed, the
buildings are equipped with sprinklers and smoke detectors proven to be in
working condition, but, would it not be better for these systems to not be
triggered at all?
Therein lies the problem. Preventing emergencies, including those caused
by natural disasters, should be the priority. Obviously, at least in HSA, this
was not the case. According to reports, this is just the latest incident and,
unfortunately, a bad one. There have been three res before this in the
hospitals ICU. Blaming the building for its age is just not on. It may be 78
years old, but if upgrading and maintenance has been of a consistently high
standard, the problem should not arise. The worry is that other old
hospitals around the country suffer from the same problems. There needs
to be a better appreciation of the safety requirements of old hospitals.
What happened at HSA should serve as a lesson that safety should not be
taken for granted.
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