Metro Pacific to invest in children’s hospital, cancer treatment clinics

Metro Pacific Investments Corp. (MPIC) is looking at building a hospital specializing in childcare and investing in a chain of cancer treatment clinics through healthcare unit Metro Pacific Hospitals Holdings Inc.

“There’s no meaningful children’s hospital in this country at all,” MPIC chairman Manuel Pangilinan said in a press briefing in Makati City on Thursday.

Pangilinan said Metro Pacific Hospitals is now looking at several sites in Metro Manila to build a children’s hospital with a minimum of 300 to 500 beds “dedicated to kids.”

He saw the need for hospitals specializing in childcare considering most medical centers are tailored to treating adult patients.

“In just ordinary hospitals, the rooms and syringes are not sized for kids,” Pangilinan noted.

Metro Pacific Hospitals is also investing in a chain of cancer treatment clinics, chief financial officer David Nicol said.

0The cancer treatment clinics would either be independent from the hospital group, or allied with the group, or in joint venture with other hospitals, Nicol noted.

Three cancer treatment clinics are currently under the hospital group, special projects director Celso Lopez said.

“One is in a hospital we don’t own … Two in hospitals we manage,” Lopez said. “We have another one, probably by end of the year ... it will be in Mindanao,” he added.

Each cancer clinic costs P300 million in investment, including the infrastructure and equipment.

Metro Pacific Hospitals saw a 10% increase in outpatient visits to 1,810,972 and a 6% growth in inpatient admissions at 96,697. —VDS, GMA News