A four-story 50-bed capacity community hospital in this town will soon cater to the residents here and in nearby towns following the groundbreaking ceremony on Monday.

In his speech, Pangasinan Governor Ramon Guico III announced that PHP250 million has been allocated for Phase 1 of the project, which covers the construction of the hospital building.

The local government unit (LGU) contributed a 3,000-square-meter lot in Barangay Poblacion as its counterpart.

Once completed, the hospital would feature a clinical laboratory, dialysis center, and diagnostic center equipped with ultrasound, CT scan, and X-ray services.

It will also have operating and delivery rooms, as well as an elevator to accommodate elderly patients and persons with disabilities (PWDs).

Guico noted that the new facility would be the 15th provincial government-run hospital in Pangasinan.

“We wanted to construct more hospitals and upgrade the existing ones,” he said, adding that the combined bed capacity of the provincial government-run hospitals, which is around 1,000 is not enough for the almost three million population of the province,” Guico said.

“We hope that the province will have 20 hospitals by the end of my third term,” he added.

He added that construction will begin after the election ban on public works.

The facility will serve the towns of Alcala, Sto. Tomas, Bautista, Bayambang, Basista, and Villasis, said officer-in-charge Provincial Health Officer Dr. Vivian Villar-Espino. (PNA)