CRAIGHEAD, Manchester — Minister of Health and Wellness Dr Christopher Tufton says the assessment phase is still ongoing in western Jamaica where approximately 100 health centres sustained damage during the passage of Hurricane Melissa just over eight months ago.

“The engineers are in the field doing the analysis now…and we do anticipate that in the next month or so we will have a better handle on what the costs are and we will start the more substantial renovation of a number of health centres,” Tufton told journalists on Thursday at the reopening of the Craighead Health Centre in northern Manchester.

The health centre serves approximately 18,000 residents across northern Manchester, bordering southern Trelawny, and underwent $45.6 million in renovation and expansion work under Operation Refresh.

Director at the Southern Regional Health Authority Michael Bent said the expenditure included the repurposing of an old staff cottage into a clinical area.

“We demolished the old cottage and we also put in concrete walls for resilience. We modernised the waiting area by putting in an air conditioning unit, and tiling the floors. The space didn’t have any parking, so we had to convert an area — a gully — into a parking area for 20-odd staff members,” he said, while adding that the scope of work also included fencing, improved bathroom facilities, and roofing.

“The roof [sustained] minor damage during the passage of Hurricane Melissa,” said Bent.

Tufton, while lauding the National Health Fund for its Operation Refresh initiative, said other programmes are to be tapped into so as to speed up the renovation of health centres.

“We also are looking at substantial renovation of some [centres] that are under the health system’s strengthening programme. We are going to be opening up a number of them over the next [few] months in Old Harbour, St Jago and Portmore,” he said.

Tufton also used the occasion to encourage young people to care more for the elderly.

“We have 375,000 Jamaicans now who are over 60 years old and by 2030 it will be over 400,000. With fewer children being born we have more older persons,” said the health minister.

“I am calling on our younger generation, our children, to look after our ageing. Don’t abandon them in hospitals or in their homes to be alone, because loneliness is a disease. And, indeed, we owe it to them as they have given back to us — whether blood relative or not,” added Tufton.