07.11.2020.

President and Supreme Commander Vučić: Hospital in Zemun will be completed in 24 days

President of the Republic and Supreme Commander of the Serbian Armed Forces Aleksandar Vučić, accompanied by the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Defence Nebojša Stefanović, PhD and Minister of Health Zlatibor Lončar, visited tonight the night shift workers who work on the construction of a new Covid hospital at the military complex "Zemun ekonomija" in Belgrade.

President Vučić pointed out that the hospital will be completed in 24 days and it would admit the first patients in 25 days. Speaking about the coronavirus pandemic, the President emphasized that today is the hardest day for Serbia and that the number of Covid infected citizens in our country will be higher than 3000 tomorrow. He thanked the Crisis Response Team and Prime Minister Ana Brnabić for the "great effort and hard work" and requested that Covid hospitals in Belgrade and Kruševac "do not remain the only salvation for all the people".

- We will admit the first patients to this hospital on 2 December, and it is incredible that anyone in Serbia can promise to build a hospital in four months, because Serbia is neither China nor America. It is incredible that such a magnificent hospital can be built in such a short time with gas, oxygen and air connections installed. The city must build four traffic lanes on the Batajnica road in the next five months. We will have 250 beds in the intensive care unit. This will be the largest hospital in Serbia, built in accordance with all standards, with intensive care unit. We are the only city in Europe to build such a hospital and I am proud of that - said President Vučić and added that the hospitals will cost about 80 million euros.

The President of Serbia congratulated all workers on their hard work and asked them to work harder than ever before, so that the hospital can be finished by 1 December.

- It will have the best equipment there is - from ventilators, to oxygen cylinders, to aesthetic machines, and we will also have mobile ventilators. There will be 930 beds, a huge potential. We will open the hospital in Kruševac on 16 or 17 December and the intensive care unit will have 150 beds. That hospital will be intended for a large part of southern Serbia and I believe that it will mean a lot. I am proud and grateful to all the workers - President Vučić emhasized.

According to him, 500 metres of sewerage and 400 metres of water supply network will be built. He also believes that, by building the hospitals in Belgrade and Kruševac, they have done "everything they could", and that it is his duty to ask the citizens "not to jeopardize their health" and stresses that "we need to save every life", because the coronavirus "is a severe and vicious disease".

- Do not make us enter a new lockdown. The whole of Europe has already done that, and we are not going to. We want to protect our people, so please observe the measures. I ask people to act responsibly, because we cannot built four more hospitals in a month. If this continues, our hospitals will be filled to capacity in five days' time. We are building two Covid hospitals, in Belgrade and Kruševac, and we are the only ones in Europe to be doing that. Help us. It is easy to criticize the state until you get sick, and when they get sick, everybody comes to the state to seeks help. I am concerned about every person in Serbia, so please take care - Pre

The new Covid hospital in Batajnica will have 1,000 hospital beds. This 18,000 square metre hospital will be the most important and the largest hospital for the treatment of Covid patients in our country. The Ministry of Defence provided an appropriate location out of the land used by that Ministry. In addition to the hospital, the construction of the supporting infrastructure, access roads and slip roads is planned.

The new hospital was also visited by the Mayor of Belgrade Zoran Radojičić, Deputy Mayor Goran Vesić, Head of the Military Health Department, Major General Uglješa Jovičić, representatives of the Ministry of Defence and the Serbian Armed Forces and other institutions involved in the construction of the hospital.