In August 2017 amongst a mountain of other assurances, the then Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar while luring the residents of Ribandar for votes had promised them he would ensure that within three months medical services and health facilities would be restored at the old Goa Medical College Hospital. Now three years later, we are told that what has been approved is just a day health dispensary. This is absolutely unacceptable. We need a 24-hour well-equipped at least 10- bedded medical facility. Besides catering to the health emergencies of the densely populated Ribandar it would benefit the residents of neighboring Old Goa, Divar, Chorao and Chimbel. The cosmetic facility proposed as a cheap gesture to pacify the residents of Ribandar is yet another failed promise and a waste of public funds.
The current Covid -19 pandemic has exposed the pathetic and depressing state of our healthcare facilities. If a state-of-the-art well-equipped medical facility is not delivered urgently at Ribandar, albeit three years late, then the Government better make available several state-of-the-art thermometers to guage the temperature of the residents in the time of the pandemic. The destructive pandemic which is escalating by the day proves that there is no greater than to provide excellent medical facilities that are easily accessible to the people. The people of Ribandar will not allow themselves to be cheated this time around.
