Site of isolation centre to be used for medical tourism

The Harrison’s Point Isolation Centre is to become a site for medical tourism once it is no longer needed for COVID-19 patients.

Prime Minister Mia Mottley said on Tuesday that she has instructed the relevant authorities to identify investors to transform the 80-acre property in St Lucy into a facility that would form part of the island’s medical tourism product.

Promising that the site would not be abandoned or allowed to fall into the same state of disrepair as the St Joseph Hospital which closed down in 1995, she told the House of Assembly “what must be done is a strategic partnership either with other local or international private sector players to maintain Harrison’s Point as a site for medical tourism as we go forward, even as we get out of the management of the COVID-19 pandemic”.

“It is necessary, and I have given the Minister of Health the remit that he must find investment along with Invest Barbados for Harrison’s Point. We are only using a fraction of the land at Harrison’s Point,” she said during debate on a resolution to rescind the 2012 resolution to lease the former St Joseph Hospital to American World Clinics (Barbados) Limited and to vest 21.485 acres of land at Ashton Hall, St Peter, in a joint venture between Government and the University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus.

“There is no doubt about the suitability of that site for tourism, but there is equally no doubt about the suitability of it for recovery and medical recovery, because the air is fresh, the view is therapeutic and, quite frankly, it is nestled in that part of the island where it is not the subject of bustling traffic and activity.

“I believe, therefore, that a combination of a site there and a site at the St Joseph Hospital will bring the provision of healthcare services to the north, but not just simply for the north or for Barbados,” Mottley added.

The Prime Minister contended that Barbados had the ability to become a premium destination for the supply of medical services globally.

“Barbados must not limit itself to its population with respect to the provision of medical services. We can be a global provider of medical services from this rock. We’ve done it in the past without knowing that we were doing it and we can do it in the future by carefully planning and structuring it out and I am open to all players and all partners,” she said.

What is currently the Harrison’s Point Isolation Centre was an old naval base that housed what was then called the Barbados Youth Service and subsequently was used as a temporary jail following the Glendairy Prison fire in 2005. The site was abandoned after use ended on both occasions.

Prime Minister Mottley said when authorities went to the site in 2020 before it was retrofitted as a primary care facility for COVID-19 patients, a lot of work was required.

“When we got there, [there was] 15-foot high bush, every wire removed, every conduit removed, every window and door removed….

“This Government and any future government must not allow that facility, which has now been used three times in the last 30 years, to fall into a state of dilapidation again,” she maintained. (RB)