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Emergency and Accident Trauma Centre to open in Batticaloa by August
View(s):A support group to improve health services in Sri Lanka has launched a project to build a modern Emergency and Accident Trauma Centre at the Batticaloa Teaching Hospital. The project titled Batticaloa Emergency and Accident Project (BEAP), is due to be completed by August 2016, by the Foundation Supporting a National Trauma Service in Sri Lanka.
Former Sri Lanka’s national Cricket coach Dav Whatmore, Kumar Sangakkara, Muttiah Muralitharan and Shane Watson are the ambassadors for the project.
The Foundation which is currently in the process of collecting funds to fit the hospital with standard equipment, hopes to receive several donations from the private sector firms as well.
Dr. David Young, a leading Orthopaedic Surgeon practising in Melbourne and a partner of the Melbourne Orthopaedic Group (MOG) said: “ A lot of money came in for the tsunami but we’re not sure where most of this money went. I went to the Victoria government and urged them donate funds because the threat of a tsunami was imminent”.
“The Governments of Victoria, Australia, the Sri Lankan Government and donations from a large International Supplier of Surgical equipment came through and upgraded the Karapitiya hospital in Galle. Batticaloa which was severely affected by the tsunami, was ignored because of the war,” he said.
“We collected about 1.4 million out of the two million USD we needed for the infrastructure and we raised US dollars 1.5 million in terms of donating brand new equipment to equip the hospital”. He said they were working with the Australian Government to bring educators here. “We need another 600,000 USD, which we hope to raise from businesses and donors from Sri Lanka.”
Nihal de Run, former Chairman of HELP SRI LANKA, a charity started soon after the Tsunami said “The main reason we targeted Batticaloa is because it was neglected due to the civil war, nobody could help the people there because of the conflict. They suffered during the war and then to make matters worse the tsunami hit. “It was easy to help southern areas but a very few people were game enough to visit Batticaloa and other tsunami affected areas in the east”.
The Rotary Club of Strathmore, Victoria Australia has adopted the project BEAP as their international project and they have linked with Rotary Club of Colombo East and the Rotary Club of Batticaloa to help with the project. The estimated building cost will be Rs. 520 million (approximately four million USD) and the fit-out and equipment cost is estimated at Rs. 260 million (approximately two million USD ).