QEH roof repairs explain leaks

Water leaking from the Queen Elizabeth Hospital’s roof following last week’s persistent rains was largely due to ongoing remedial work,  Acting Chief Operations Officer Louise Bobb has said.

Her explanation came in response to viral videos of the leaks which suggested the roof was buckling under the intense rainfall.

Patients and staff on wards A1, A2, A3, the Recovery Room and Surgical Intensive Care Unit (SICU) had already been relocated to other parts of the hospital to allow for the remedial work on the roof to be done in phases, Bobb told journalists.

She said the work should be completed in just under two weeks.

“We are about to complete the first phase, which is the repairs…for A1 and A2, and then we will continue once that is settled to A3,” said the administrator. “The work was slightly hampered by the inclement weather that we have experienced so far and we know that we had volumes of water in the last couple of days.

“But we will continue to work when there is less rain at this time to finish the work as soon as possible, and return the wards back to their original homes. Right now, we have transferred all the patients and we are housing them at other parts of the hospital so nobody is getting wet or anything.”

Bobb further explained that the concrete roof has been through several rounds of repairs in the past since the hospital was built in 1964.

QEH Deputy Chairman Dr Abdul-Rehman Mohamed also told reporters that the viral videos of water leaking from the hospital’s roof during rainfall were shot when protective layers were stripped as part of the repair process.

He said: “People may have interpreted it as a worse situation. But it is actually part of the repair process where the roof is now exposed and the removal of all of the protection, and when the rain comes you would see it. But as Ms Bobb mentioned, patients have all been relocated while that repair work is being done, and it is being done in phases.” (AH)