Pamintuan reports to the people. Photo by Deng Pangilinan
ANGELES CITY– This city’s Ospital ning Angeles now has more dialysis machines than the National Kidney Institute (NKI) and Philippine General Hospital (PGH) combined.
This was among the major accomplishments cited by Mayor Edgardo Pamintuan in his State of the City Address (SOCA) here the other day.
“We have 180 regular patients with serious kidney ailments whose lives the ONA has extended and over 6,000 dialysis procedures at the hospital” in the recent months since the ONA Renal Care Center was established, he said.
Pamintuan said the ONA has a total of 19 dialysis machines donated by the Angeles City Chamber of Commer and Industry, noting that this is more than the combined machines of the NKI and PGH.
This, even as Pamintuan gave his administration a grade of 84 percent in the accomplishment of eight major programs he dubbed as “Contract with Angelenos” (CWA) during his SOCA in July last year.
In this year’s SOCA delivered Wednesday before city officials and leaders of local multi-sectoral groups, Pamintuan also cited as part of CWA the construction of the City College of Angeles primarily for talented children from poor families.
“We have started classes in three courses this semester, even if the building construction has yet to be finished.
The courses include computer science, information system and tourism which are being held at the city library,” he said.
The college already has 369 students, including 82 academic scholars and 28 indigent scholars of the city government.
About 1,200 students could be taken in by the next semester with more courses to be offered. Once fully finished, the City College of Angeles could absorb 4,000 students, he said.
Pamintuan said the courses to be offered would be tailor fitted for employment demands in the city, as well as in Clark Freeport.
This, amid the increase of the city’s scholarship budget from P5 million to P6.5 million.
“We have also shelved P13 milyon for the repair of 32 classrooms,” Pamintuan said.
He also noted that from being a butt of jokes in the past for its poor service, the Ospital ning Angeles (ONA) has been significantly upgraded.
“I made this a personal crusade. I had built the ONA in 1995, because our old hospital was washed away by lahar flows in 1991. So I am pained whenever ONA is criticized,” he said.
Pamintuan cited the help of the Michigan, Illinois-based World Medical Relief Inc., headed by Kapampangan George Samson, which gave significant donations to the ONA in the past two years.
“This October, more new equipment and facilities costing P8 million are arriving . I had arranged for this during my recent visit to Illinois,” he said.
He also bared plans to construct a new P50 million building for ONA which is also undergoing rehabilitation.
“Groundbreaking for the new building will be next month, and we expect the building to be up by the end of the year,” he added.
Pamintuan reported that from July 2010 to last April, ONA had treated over 185,072 patients from local poor folk. “Compare to other public hospital in our area, this figure is the biggest so far,” he noted.
“But one of our biggest accomplishments is the construction of the Renal Care Center at ONA.
This is the first and only treatment center put up by a local government,” he said, as he thanked the Angeles City Filipino-Chinese Chamber of Commerce for the donation of 19 dialysis machines.
Pamintuan also boasted of the newly opened “MediKalinga” at the Boy Scout Compound in Barangay Sto. Domingo for minor surgery services for indigents. “There, we conduct free minor surgeries every Friday,
Saturday and Sunday,” he noted.
This, even as the city government has started distribution of another set of Philhealth membership cards numbering 20,000 worth P30 million during so-called Barangay Days.
Since May, 2010, about 60,000 local folk have also benefitted from roving doctors and dentists in this city, Pamintuan also reported, while another 85,000 people received free medicines from the Mayor’s Office, the City Health Office, the Gender and Development Office, and even at the mayor’s residence.
“I take pride of the fact that we have the most number of health professionals – doctors, dentists, nurses, medical technologists and midwives — in the Rural Health Units of Angeles City than any local government in Central Luzon, “ Pamintuan also said.
Last year, the city government was recognized in various awards including the 2011 Local Governance Performance System Award for “Wastong Pamamahala” and was ranked 4th among the Top Highly Urbanized Cities in the Philippines; the Seal of Good Housekeeping award from the Department of Interior and Local Government; Hall of Fame Award for the City’s Public Employment and Service Office from the Department of Labor and Employment.
Pamintuan himself was declared Man of the Year by Punto Central Luzon newspaper and was named in the top five in Asia and top 25 in the international search for World Mayor.
Every first Saturday, Pamintuan joins local Bishop Virgilio Pablo David in leading local folk in the clean-up of Sapang Balen creek downtown, even as he actively supports the Task Force One Million Trees led by Bishop Jose Briones of the Church of the Latter Day Saints.
