Push to expand Sydney Hospital

State Member for Sydney Alex Greenwich and Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore are pushing for an expansion of Sydney Hospital, which is roughly a quarter of the size it was in the 1980s.

The political allies say the CBD’s only hospital has been repeatedly downgraded while the resident and worker population of the city centre has boomed.

In the early 1980s, the Macquarie St facility had over 400 beds and an intensive care unit (ICU). Today, the Sydney Hospital and Sydney Eye Hospital (SSEH), as it is officially known, has 113 beds – approximately half for eye patients only – and no ICU.

Mr Greenwich said the situation highlighted the way infrastructure had not kept pace with demographic changes.

“Essential services were pulled out of the inner city when the trend was for people to move to the suburbs,” he said.

“But now we have people moving back into the city, and successive State Governments have failed to keep up.

“It’s the same with education. People are having to travel out of their area because inner city schools have been closed.”

Mr Greenwich urged the State Government to “assess the health and hospital needs of the inner city”, with a view to restoring Sydney Hospital to its former capacity.

Ms Moore, who repeatedly championed the hospital in her 24 years as state Member for Sydney, backed Mr Greenwich.

“Every community, including those in the inner city, deserves access to high-quality health care,” she said.

“Successive State Governments have downgraded services at Sydney Hospital without community consultation or sufficient planning. Services have been shifted to St Vincent’s Hospital but without sufficient increase to their funding.”

Federal Member for Sydney Tanya Plibersek took a somewhat different view.

“Sydney Hospital is a beautiful but old facility, and modern medical care often requires modern medical settings and equipment,” said Ms Plibersek, who is also Federal Minister for Health.

“I support Sydney Hospital having an important role in health care recognising that acute care and emergency are better delivered in modern purpose-built surroundings.”

But Ms Plibersek said the Federal Government was increasing NSW Health funds and encouraged Mr Greenwich to pursue the State Government for the inner city’s fair share.

“Commonwealth funding of the NSW Health system will increase by 23 per cent over the next four years … an extra $1.1 billion,” she said.

NSW Health representatives would not answer specific questions but issued a general statement spruiking Sydney Hospital’s role as part of the wider health network.

“SSEH is part of the South Eastern Sydney Local Health District and complements the clinical services offered by neighbouring hospital and health facilities,” said the statement attributed to Mr Andrew Bernard, Director of Operations, SSEH.

Mr Bernard said SSEH had become a “centre of excellence” in the areas of eye, hand and sexual health, and had “a fully functional and recently refurbished emergency department and a medical ward for appropriate acute admissions”.

Sydney Hospital was established in 1811 and is the oldest hospital in Australia. While it has been significantly downgraded in recent decades, it has avoided the fate of many other inner city hospitals. Numerous Inner Sydney hospitals have been shut down since 1980 including the Crown St Women’s Hospital, Surry Hills; the King George V Memorial Hospital, Camperdown; the Rachel Forster Hospital, Redfern; the Royal Hospital for Women, Paddington; the Royal South Sydney Hospital, Zetland; and St Margaret’s Hospital, Surry Hills.