Quezon City
January 23, 2024

“Today, we celebrate the collaboration of two hospitals, which, more than neighbors, are partners in battling diseases that inflict pain on our people – and on their pockets as well,” President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. remarked as he led the official launching of the Lung Center of the Philippines (LCP) and the National Kidney and Transplant Institute (NKTI) Lung Transplant Program in Diliman, Quezon City.

In his message, President Marcos Jr. commended the frontliners in white coats of both hospitals for exhibiting courage and making a defiant stand at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“If there is one postcard of grit which captured their stubborn resistance, it was that of Lung Center personnel, fashioning PPEs out of garbage bags, when the influx of patients overran supplies,” he said.

Furthermore, the President emphasized that the partnership between LCP and NKTI can be a template in which hospitals pool their resources and share assets to boost patient care and improve bottom lines, citing that the Lung Transplant Program is an application of the proven maxim that two hospitals are better than one.

“This creates the infrastructure for lung transplants in the country, with the first one to be done within 2024,” he conveyed.

The Chief Executive expressed his optimism in succeeding the initiatives upon which medicine has advanced and diseases have retreated.

“Build Better More is the same ethos which should animate us today, to march forward, instead of just running in place,” said the President, mentioning that this is the same grand vision which prompted the establishment of the LCP, NKTI and the Philippine Heart Center.

Strengthening the Administration’s commitment in healthcare, President Marcos Jr. highlighted the following actions that render support to the program. These include training doctors, adding lung specialty centers and expanding nursing education.

“All of these support what the LCP-NKTI Lung Transplant Program seeks to achieve: to provide competent, committed and compassionate care to our people,” he said.

To this end, President Marcos Jr. emphasized that healthcare is a public commitment driven by neither political agendas nor personal legacy projects.

“In this hospital where heroes walked and worked, may this program be a testament to our unwavering duty to serve the Filipino people,” the President concluded in his message.

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