Financial Times

Two more hospitals from Hemas?

Hemas Holdings is planning to build two more hospitals in addition to the one coming up at Wattala, industry sources said.

“The locations have not been identified as yet, but the company plans to build two more hospitals and establish a hospital chain,” one source said. He said that this is in line with the company’s strategy of getting into the hospitals sector which will complement its pharmaceuticals business.

The company’s healthcare sector continued to show good progress with healthy growth in both turnover and profits, on the back of the 25 percent strategic acquisition in eChannelling Ltd, which controls the doctor reservation system at most leading private hospitals in the country.

“Sri Lanka’s health indicators are impressive in comparison to other countries in this region.

The country boasts of a life expectancy of 73 years, an infant mortality rate of 11.2 per 1,000 live births (2003) and a maternal mortality of 0.1 per 1,000 live births (2002),” a healthcare specialist said adding that the private sector accounted for 57 percent of the investment in this sector.

He said that the health reforms introduced in 1997 to address a number of major issues in the health sector continued to be implemented in 2005, focusing on the five thrust areas of at least improving one hospital in each district, expanding services to areas of special needs, developing health promotion programmes, reforming the organisational structure, including the development of alternative financing mechanism and promoting resource sharing with the private sector.

“With these statistics, it becomes inevitable that a greater healthcare investment is required to continue providing healthcare for a longer period to this population,” he added.

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