The first stone of the extension of Cabueñes, eight years later

Eight years after the
Government Council of the Principality of Asturiasthen with Javier Fernández at the helm, gave the green light to the expansion and reform of the
Cabueñes University Hospital, and almost five years after the official presentation of the final project, this morning the first stone was laid. This is an act that symbolizes the beginning of construction work on the new eight-storey block for general services and which was attended by many of the people who participated in its “previous construction”.

Former health ministers Faustino Blanco, at the time the first to raise the need for the expansion, and Francisco del Busto, with whom the project was designed and presented, in 2017; also the former mayors of Gijón, Carmen Moriyón (hospital surgeon himself) and Paz Fernández Felgueroso. And a large representation of the staff of the hospital itself, from department heads and middle managers to members of the board of directors, who wanted to take part in a day “awaited and awaited” by all. “It was not easy to get here. It involved the work of many people for a long time. People who have been the protagonists of this project since the foundations, ”thanked the Minister of Health, Pablo Fernández.

“Improving healthcare is always an unfinished business, but today we have taken one of those milestones. The most anticipated work in Gijón and in all of Area V”, stressed the President of the Principality, Adrián Barbón, in his speech before recalling how the mayor, Ana González, also present at the event, “didn’t ceased to urge labor for a minute since the beginning of his mandate”, with “a stubborn insistence”.

Without a doubt, the first phase of the Cabueñes expansion and improvement project is the most important work of the Ministry of Health of this term. And “yes or yes, as a matter of justice”, it had to start, noted Barbón.

The act took place under a tent next to the land on which the new building will be erected which will house the emergency room (with twice the space it currently has), the surgical block, the laboratories, the intensive care or outpatient clinics, among other services. According to Barbón, it was not just a question of making visible that the construction of a building had begun (the initial works began on August 19), but the construction of “another stage of Asturian health”. “Let’s be ambitious and take advantage of the fact that we have enough resources to become a major biohealth development hub that will attract talent and generate innovation, knowledge and employment. This first stone today is also a milestone more on the way to this horizon”.

Prior to his speech, Barbón had deposited a copy of EL COMERCIO and another of La Nueva España, in addition to several legal tender coins, in a transparent urn, like a “time capsule”. “They left me the good,” he joked. Other objects had been presented before him by the most active veteran of the hospital, the radiologist Miguel Dúo (a copy of the magazine Primula); the manager of Espace Sanitaire V, Manuel Bayona (the Principality’s Silver Medal awarded to health workers for their professional excellence and the badge that the Space gives to its agents when they retire); the Minister of Health, Pablo Fernández (a face of gratitude “to all the people who have contributed to making this project a reality” and the plans for the extension, on paper and in PDF format on a USB key); the mayor of Carreño, Amelia Fernández (some figures of a sardine and a sardine dressed in traditional costume); the mayor of Villaviciosa, Alejandro Vega (a handkerchief of the Portal parties, celebrated these days) and the mayor of Gijón, Ana González (a character with the letters of the city).

The Cabueñes expansion works, González said, mean Zone V will have “a great infrastructure that will represent modernity” and that “puts us at the forefront of public health.”