MONTEGO BAY, St James — More construction workers from China are expected to arrive in Jamaica sometime after February 17 — the date for Chinese New Year 2026 — to increase the pace of work on the Western Children and Adolescents Hospital in Montego Bay.

Minister of Health and Wellness Dr Christopher Tufton told journalists at a media briefing in St James, on Saturday that this is part of a plan to complete work on the hospital by the end of this year.

The construction of the hospital, which is being funded by the Chinese Government, is in its final stages but there has been a noticeable slowdown of the work recently after a number of workers returned home to China.

“We have had some issues with [work on] the children’s hospital…that are more contractor-related than rescoping related. The challenge with Cornwall [Regional Hospital] has been more rescoping related, deciding to strip down the entire building as opposed to fix one thing,” said Tufton as he sought to explain the downtime in the work.

“The conversations that are taking place, however, are that they should speed up,” added Tufton who pointed out that while the Jamaican Government has oversight responsibility for the project, control over contractors is limited, as the hospital is a gift from the Chinese Government.

“Contractors have been engaged via China and the Government, that is, and the contractual arrangements are within that corridor. So, we don’t have as much control except encouragement, moral suasion, and friendship,” insisted Tufton.

He added that despite the challenges he is optimistic that the work will continue at pace to ensure people in and around St James can soon access the children’s hospital as well as the redesigned Cornwall Regional for health-care treatment.

“We are working in earnest to try and ensure that we meet a timeline for this year so that we can have both facilities opened up within that period of time and a lot of work is going on,” Tufton added.

The health minister pointed out plans are already far advanced to fill staff positions for the two health facilities when they become operational.

“We have a head of human resources, senior medical officer, and a chief executive officer, and they are working now on the HR [human resources] plans, real transition to try and ensure that when we open, even though we may have to phase in the services, it will at least commence and we can fill any gaps that exist “ declared Tufton.

However, he admitted that despite those steps the health ministry is aware of the potential HR challenges in terms of filling the vacancies, particularly given the scale of the new facility.

“So the issue of HR resources, skill sets, is a major one. It’s quite significant, it’s a big challenge, we have said it before, it’s not news,” Tufton argued.

According to Tufton, to address potential staffing gaps, Jamaica has engaged with several countries including the Philippines, India, Nigeria, and Ghana.

“The Foreign Minister of Ghana [Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa] was in Jamaica and there was a big conversation around MOUs [memorandums of understanding] and looking at alternatives where we have gaps that we can’t fill locally,” said Tufton as he underscored that opening a new hospital presents many unique challenges.

“Starting up a hospital is new to this generation, because we really have not had a new hospital in my generation… I’m not that young, even though I’m not old either, just to be clear,” quipped Tufton.

He explained that while the hospital could eventually employ more than 1,000 workers, services will be phased in to ensure efficiency and avoid operational problems.

“When I looked at the HR plan — and the regional technical director is here — you’re talking about hundreds and hundreds of workers. I think you’re talking about, at its optimal level, more than 1,000 workers, right? We won’t start with 1,000, we will start with a subset of that,” Tufton pointed out.

He noted that staff currently handling paediatric cases at Cornwall Regional Hospital will be integrated into the new children’s facility alongside ongoing recruitment and expanded training.

“So we can see automatically starting up using who we have. We are recruiting now. Some of those recruits will come from local, some will come from wherever we can find them. That’s just the truth, because health-care workers are scarce,” declared Tufton.

Minister of Health and Wellness Dr Christopher Tufton addressing a media briefing in St James on Saturday.