National Emergency Centre - Work Nears Completion

The first ever National Emergency Centre in Cameroon will soon be a reality. The Minister of Public Health, André Mama Fouda visited the construction at the Yaounde Centre Hospital on Wednesday June 19, 2013. He was accompanied by the Secretary of State for Health in charge of Epidemics and Pandemics, Alim Hayatou, and the Korean Ambassador to Cameroon, Cho June-Hyuck. The purpose of the visit was to evaluate the level of the project.

After serious inspection, André Mama Fouda expressed satisfaction with the level of work done so far. The Minister said work is in the finishing phase and he thinks that the deadline which was given to open the first National Emergency Centre in Cameroon by the end of this year will be effective. He said that the equipment is already in place and that if everything goes on well, training of staff will also start soon. He said the construction of the emergency centre is in line with instructions of the Head of State to modernise infrastructure in order to give good care to patients. One of the architects, Samuel Owang, said work is about 90 per cent done so far and that the initial cost of the project stands at over FCFA 2 billion.

The National Emergency Centre located in the premises of the Yaounde Central Hospital is a two-storey building equipped with 50 beds, a trauma zone, emergency care departments, departments for seriously-burnt patients and x-ray. The structure will be completed by December 2013. The centre is constructed by the Korean International Cooperation Agency (KOICA) Cameroon.