Monday marked the 15th anniversary of the devastating fire at St. Jude Hospital (SJH), with Vieux Fort residents intensifying calls for an end to ‘political games’ regarding the facility’s long-delayed reconstruction.
The SJH fire, between midnight and 1 a.m. on September 9, 2009, tragically claimed the lives of two patients on site, with a third dying en route to Victoria Hospital in Castries.
Since the blaze, the hospital has been operating out of the George Odlum National Stadium, an arrangement that residents and staff alike describe as inadequate.
The Saint Lucia Labour Party (SLP) and the United Workers Party (UWP) have led initiatives to reconstruct the facility, but progress has been slow.
The current SLP administration, which renewed reconstruction efforts in November 2022, deemed the previous building—constructed under the UWP—as unfit for use.
And Vieux Fort residents, speaking anonymously, have been voicing their frustration.
“It’s not fair to us that we do not have a proper hospital,” one local told St. Lucia Times.
“It should have been done a long time ago. Politics shouldn’t have to mix with this. The government who’s there start it, the other one who’s coming in continue, because this is a necessity.”
Hospital staff echo these sentiments, telling St. Lucia Times that while there is ongoing construction and refurbishment within the stadium, there is a lack of clear communication about when a new facility might be ready.
“They give us no updates here at the hospital… They gave us notice of renovations, which means if you are renovating, we are not going to move from here anytime soon,” said one staff member.
Residents also expressed concern over the transparency of the reconstruction process.
They asserted that significant funds have been borrowed for the project and are demanding greater clarity on how these resources are being utilised.
As the community grapples with lacking a dedicated hospital for their medical needs, they ask: Why has it taken so long to rebuild St. Jude’s Hospital? And how much longer will residents have to wait for a facility that meets their essential healthcare needs?
In a statement marking the 15th anniversary of the SJH fire, Health, Wellness, and Elderly Affairs Minister Moses Jn Baptiste reiterated the government’s commitment to re-establishing the medical facility.
Acknowledging that the people of Saint Lucia and the South had waited ‘for too long’, Jn Baptiste disclosed that there would be a contract signing this week signalling the final phase of the reconstruction project.
In this regard, he announced that delivery would occur ‘in the shortest possible time’.
File Photo: Prime Minister Philip J. Pierre and other officials tour the St. Jude Hospital reconstruction project.
Politicians playing y’all for fools because y’all are fools. Blind loyalty to party will be the end of this country.
Choops just this morning I drive thru Larachose going up to Laborie I just happen to pass by St Jude’s and they working on the hospital . Should it have been done already ? Yes ! Long time but let’s see what the new year brings, but for the critics yes it been worked on I saw myself argument done.
This is the problem in Saint Lucia, the two main political parties do not really, genuinely care about the people, both of the main parties are forever in campaign mode, both parties are all about friends, family, and foreigners. I want someone to justify for me the paying of a consultant for St Judes EC $100 000.00 a month! Look at the four lane proposed highway in Gros Islet, nothing since a change of government! Our country will never progress once an incoming government shelves all ideas and projects which are not their own! And yet people will quarrel, curse, and say the vilest things about each other for the sake of the party they support! As the song says, ‘when will they ever learn’.
And top of all that there is an incompetent Board. A real waste of time Board and A management that’s clueless.
People of st lucia! We have power! We can easily demonstrate…..strike like the French do! Until we get what we want
It is a shame that after fifteen years and hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer funds have gone to waste, exposing the incompetence of politicians in Saint Lucia to deliver on one of the most important and fundamental institutions for any nation, a healthcare facility. The people of Saint Lucia must demand accountability from every one of the past administrations, starting with Stephenson King, Kenny Anthony, Alan Chastenet, and Philip Pierre, and to the extent that the law would allow, hold them criminally responsible for every person who depended on SJH for care but would eventually perish as a result of the absence of such care because of the malfeasance of these individuals. The public must make the case to connect the death, ill-health, or other healthcare shortfalls of the population, especially those in the south, since the demise of SJH, to the negligence of these politicians who have squandered the resources of the country in advancement of their continued political and leadership incompetence!
I was born at SJH; my mother died after being sent home from a fall without receiving proper care (a simple blood thinner would have averted the aneurysm she dried from as a result of the fall). So I share in the frustration of all in Saint Lucia who are just disgusted by all this political grandstanding and pontification by the leaders of the day (no difference in the actions of all who came before) as yet again, another multi-million loan secured to “finish” SJH. I think we deserve more than another moment of political gloating at the expense of the people who blindly recycle them into national leadership!