ARUSHA, Tanzania, Aug. 28 — Cases of tourists falling sick during
their trips to Tanzania are rare though it happens and realizing that, a
large modern hospital to offer international standards of treatments is
under construction in an area close to Serengeti National Park.
The hospital has been built in north-western Tanzania’s district of
Serengeti, and will be serving people in the district and also foreign
visitors at the adjacent national park. The new facility is expected to be
completed next year. “The Tanzania National Parks (TANAPA) is one of the
big players in the construction of the medical facility,” Charles Mlingwa,
Mara Regional Commissioner said here on Sunday. TANAPA has contributed
22,319 dollars as part of its contribution towards the ambitious medical
project. “The construction works for the first phase are underway,”
explained Mlingwa, pointing out that the medical facility is planned to be
like any other hospital found in developed countries.
The first phase involves the setting up of the Out-Patient Department wing
and this has so far cost nearly 1 million dollars out of the planned 1.5
million dollars to complete the OPD buildings by December 2017, so that the
hospital could open next January.The Hospital will also provide medical
services to 78 villages mapped within the Serengeti District in Mara
Region. Other than local residents, the modern medical facility also
targets to cater for the nearly 400,000 tourists who visit the Serengeti
National Park annually. “While we are working to promote our tourist
destinations across the country, it is now important to ensure that once
the foreign visitors arrive here, they also get assured of reliable medical
services when touring remote national parks,” said Allan Kijazi, the TANAPA
Director General. Most foreign tourists who visit national parks come with
their respective medical insurance covers and rely on flying doctors to
airlift them to either Nairobi or Arusha cities upon falling ill during
their game drives, however with the modern hospital in place, they can now
be attended to right there in Serengeti. – XINHUA
