Cebu's government health services in the 1930s
(Part 2)
The Southern Island's Hospital was renamed Vicente Sotto Memorial Medical Center by virtue of Republic Act 7528 on May 21, 1992. The law was authored by then Congressman Antonio Veloso Cuenco who was born on March 26, 1936, a year earlier before the Municipality of Cebu was inaugurated as a city. Congressman Tony Cuenco, a lawyer, is a grandson of Don Mariano Jesus Cuenco who was a contemporary and a colleague of Don Vicente Sotto in the Senate. Last year the Senate enacted Republic Act 10770 dated April 26, 2016 upgrading VSMMC from 800 hospital beds to 1,200 hospital beds.
To continue with the report on the health services of Cebu made in 1937:
"The Maternity House of Cebu was established and has been operated by the Cebu Women's Club, but given an annual aid from the insular, provincial and municipal funds. It has a capacity of 30 beds. There are five private rooms, one pay ward, and 16 charity beds. It conducts a school of midwifery. The province of Cebu has one of the largest and best organized puericulture center organizations in the Philippines, employing 11 physicians, 19 nurses, and 42 midwives. Every one of the 51 municipalities except three has an active center. The city of Cebu itself has six independent centers and one incorporated with the Community Health Social Center. The Red Cross organization takes charge of local Red Cross activities and includes as a part of the work the inspection of school children by nurses and the giving of dental treatment at their travelling school dental clinic.
"Although established by the Leonard Wood Memorial, the Leprosy Epidemiological unit is run with the cooperation of the Bureau of Health. The Eversley Childs treatment station, located on a 50 hectare land on the mountain site of Consolacion, 11 miles from the city proper, is operated by the Bureau of Health for the segregation and treatment of lepers from the eastern Visayan provinces. It has a total capacity of 780 beds. The Negative Barrio under the charge of the Red Cross conducts a sort of an extension work of that covered by the Eversley Childs treatment station. It takes care of the dependent and rejected paroled lepers. It has a capacity of 40 beds, divided among 30 cottages. Like the treatment station it is within easy motoring distance from the city.
"Private owned institutions: The Cebu General Clinic and St. Joseph Hospital which are both owned by a group of medical practitioners. The former has a capacity of 16 beds, while the latter has four beds more. The Holy Child Hospital is owned by the archbishop of Cebu and is run by the Sisters of St. Paul de Chartres. Its total capacity is 18, the Holy Child Hospital, the first Catholic institution of its kind in Cebu, needs the cooperation and support of the public, particularly from the Catholics themselves coming from the city proper and the towns of the province, and from the neighboring island provinces. Under its roof all classes of patients seeking hospital care are admitted and taken care of, irrespective of his or her religion. But inasmuch as Cebu, possessing the rare distinction of being the seat of the archbishopric, is a Catholic province and the greater bulk of the patients come this place, the spiritual care of such patients will thus be amply assured. Besides, it is not the physical body alone that needs special care, but the soul as well."