JOHANNESBURG, December 2 (ANA) – The Nelson Mandela Children’s Hospital in Johannesburg officially opened its doors to the public on Friday, twelve years after the first brick was laid to bring the former iconic president’s idea to life.
This brings to fruition the ambitious task of the Nelson Mandela Children’s Hospital Trust which was established to raise R1 billion from the private and public sectors, as well as ordinary individuals, to build a state-of-the-art 200-bed and 10-theatre paediatric hospital.
The Nelson Mandela Children’s Hospital is home to more paediatric ICU beds than all of Gauteng’s hospitals combined.
The referral-only hospital boasts 17 dialysis machines and seven imaging units that can treat up to 2,500 patients a month to provide lifesaving treatment, from neurology through to heart and pyschiatric conditions.
Universities in the province came to the party as Wits donated the land on which the hospital is built and a University of Johannesburg student designed the beds “to be more child-friendly”.
The hospital is expected to begin admitting patients by mid-2017.
Programme director and the hospital’s ambassador, rapper ProVerb, reminded the audience that Monday would exactly be three years since Mandela died.
Chief executive of the Nelson Mandela Children’s Hospital Trust, Sibongile Mkhabela, thanked all the donors who had contributed towards realising Mandela’s dream, especially the donated Holland-based Noortman family which had donated $1 million “in the early days”.
Mkhabela said the hospital would break the glass ceiling to primary healthcare for children. She said the hospital was a true testament to Mandela’s vision of a nation caring for its children.
“Today is for us to say thank you for trusting us with the birth of this facility. It is in diversity that we found our strength,” Mkhabela said.
“There is no exclusivity in this place. Our children will now get first class service. The glass ceiling we put up for the poor needs to be broken. Contrary to popular belief, South Africa is ready to recreate and re-imagine itself. At the core of this facility is a beating heart.”
Government said the Nelson Mandela Children’s hospital would add much-needed skills and technology to Gauteng’s ability to treat sick children.
– African News Agency (ANA)
