27 Nov 2024
In the final part of his six-part series on the health system Mike Hunter contemplates what next for the new Dunedin hospital?
26 Nov 2024
As the campaign to “Save our Southern Hospital’’ continues, one couple is taking the message to the road.
26 Nov 2024
A leak in Dunedin’s ageing hospital caused a partial ceiling collapse yesterday and left water streaming into a room where sterile surgery equipment is stored.
25 Nov 2024
The United Nations Association of New Zealand claims the government could be in violation of the right to health, with the continued changes to the new Dunedin hospital.
23 Nov 2024
A shiny new, state-of-the-art hospital for Dunedin was a promise made by Labour and carried forward by National in their election campaign. Ben Tomsett reports on the $3 billion Dunedin Hospital saga.
22 Nov 2024
Developer Russell Lund remains unconvinced by arguments against refurbishing the former Dunedin hospital building.
22 Nov 2024
Professor Garry Nixon is Director of the University of Otago’s Centre for Rural Health, and a rural doctor at Dunstan Hospital in Clyde. OPINION: Complex geography, a small, dispersed population base and increasingly specialised modern healthcare combine to create a unique set of health system challenges in Otago and Southland.
22 Nov 2024
Professor Tim Wilkinson is Acting Dean of Otago Medical School and Professor of Medicine and Medical Education. OPINION: Medical schools exist to advance the health of the country. They do this by training fit-for-purpose doctors and by advancing medical knowledge.
22 Nov 2024
Locals can support the Save Our Southern Hospital campaign by visiting ‘Cliff’, Dunedin City Council’s campaign ambulance, in Wānaka this afternoon
21 Nov 2024
It doesn’t matter whether you’re driving a tractor in northern Southland or a Mercedes down George St in Dunedin, Jason Herrick told a packed Dunedin Town Hall on Monday night – with health we’re all on a level playing field and we all need the same services.
20 Nov 2024
Rob Campbell, former chair of Te Whatu Ora, gave a speech on “The future of health infrastructure” at an event organised by The Opportunities Party in Dunedin on 17 November, where he shared his views on how to improve the current system.
19 Nov 2024
Dunedin clinicians have provided feedback on the two options the government called for when it announced a $1.88 billion cap on Dunedin’s new hospital — and both "fall far short", senior clinician Dr Sheila Barnett says.
19 Nov 2024
A sea of Southerners filled Dunedin's Town Hall last night in support of the Save Our Southern Hospital campaign.
18 Nov 2024
Paul Miller is a big man with a big message. The former number 8, who made the All Blacks over two decades ago, is also a cancer survivor turned health advocate. He told a packed rally on Monday night why he was against proposed cuts to the Dunedin Hospital project.
18 Nov 2024
Seven weeks after Health Minister Shane Reti and Infrastructure Minister Chris Bishop came to Dunedin to scaremonger about the Dunedin hospital rebuild, we are no clearer about what will happen next.
18 Nov 2024
A Dunedin Town Hall meeting has been held as part of a campaign for the new Dunedin hospital.
18 Nov 2024
The Dunedin mayor is disappointed but unsurprised the Health Minister will be a no show at a meeting tonight to protest any cuts to the Dunedin Hospital rebuild project.
18 Nov 2024
Financial efficiency is blamed for the government rethinking its plan to renovate Dunedin Hospital, which could leave rural areas of the Southern region at risk.
16 Nov 2024
The government will not say whether selling the outpatients building is still an option to help fund the new Dunedin hospital project.
15 Nov 2024
A ‘‘raucous’’ Dunedin Town Hall meeting is set to be the next stage of the campaign for the new Dunedin hospital.
15 Nov 2024
The incident was the direct result of an underfunded health system, “a broken hospital that urgently needs replacing and a Government which just doesn’t care about mothers in the lower South”.
15 Nov 2024
Health officials have investigated selling the outpatients building to help fund the beleaguered new Dunedin hospital project, the Otago Daily Times has learned.
14 Nov 2024
A petition delivered to the government on Wednesday of last week garnered more than 34,400 signatures.
14 Nov 2024
Health New Zealand (HNZ) has not said what it is spending on the consultants it has looking into retrofitting the old ward tower block at Dunedin hospital.
14 Nov 2024
Senior officials at Health New Zealand Te Whatu Ora (HNZ) are raising doubts about the option of refurbishing Dunedin Hospital, sources say.
14 Nov 2024
When the prime minister visited Dunedin a fortnight ago, something important was conspicuously missing from his visit: us.
13 Nov 2024
Shifting surgical services to rural hospitals is not an alternative to a proper rebuild of Dunedin hospital, Mike Hunter writes in part five of his series on the health system.
09 Nov 2024
Parliamentary security is not overly fond of seeing vehicles on the forecourt - it still has nightmares about former National MP Shane Ardern driving Myrtle the tractor up the stairs in 2003 during an anti-methane tax protest.
09 Nov 2024
First the Octagon, then the South, then the roads leading to Cook Strait, and finally the other island and Parliament itself.
09 Nov 2024
A town hall meeting will be another opportunity for the public to send a message to health decision-makers, Dunedin’s mayor says.
09 Nov 2024
There are disgruntled and confused voices in the construction industry following extensive redesign and delays to construction of the new Dunedin hospital’s inpatient building. Mary Williams investigates.
09 Nov 2024
Consultants have been brought in to examine retrofitting the existing Dunedin Hospital instead of constructing a new inpatient building, the Otago Daily Times has learned.
04 Nov 2024
Cliff the repurposed ambulance garnered plenty of attention in Oamaru on Saturday on its trip north for the Save our Southern Hospital campaign.
04 Nov 2024
Dunedin City Council's Save Our Southern Hospital Campaign is hitting Wellington on Wednesday, where Cliff the Ambulance will deliver a petition to Parliament.
01 Nov 2024
Embracing the Halloween spirit to protest hospital cuts at the University of Otago are (from left) Dunedin City Council campaign assistant Emily Paton and councillors Sophie Barker and Mandy Mayhem with Cliff the ambulance.
01 Nov 2024
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has vowed to build Dunedin a "kick-arse" hospital.
01 Nov 2024
The Save Our Southern Hospital campaign left Dunedin for Wellington this morning, with much ado about Cliff the Ambulance.
31 Oct 2024
Perhaps side-stepping a Halloween horror-show, Prime minister Christopher Luxon avoided questions, and provided no answers about the fate of the new Dunedin Hospital during a low-key, high-security visit to the city today.
31 Oct 2024
Actor Sam Neill has called proposed cutbacks to the Dunedin Hospital "short-sighted, careless, heartless, ruthless".
31 Oct 2024
Star actor Sir Sam Neill has described the Government’s Dunedin Hospital funding-cut plans as “short-sighted, careless, heartless, ruthless”.
31 Oct 2024
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has been called "cowardly" after hurrying in a back door to avoid a hospital protest in central Dunedin.
31 Oct 2024
The Dunedin City Council is not ruling out boosting their hospital campaign coffers again, after retrospectively approving $146,000 to cover costs.
31 Oct 2024
Careless, heartless and ruthless — those are a few of the words used by actor Sir Sam Neill to describe government cuts to the planned new Dunedin hospital.
31 Oct 2024
Protesters gathered in Dunedin as Prime Minister Christopher Luxon arrived for the Class Act Awards, which award scholarships to top secondary school students, at the Dunedin Public Art Gallery on Thursday morning.
31 Oct 2024
Health New Zealand has refused to release information that would shed light on the escalating costs at the new Dunedin Hospital build.
30 Oct 2024
Council staff have added a last-minute item to today’s Dunedin City Council meeting agenda, asking councillors to approve $146,099 for the Save Our Southern Hospital campaign — most of which has already been spent.
29 Oct 2024
The Emergency Department is a barometer of the hospital’s function, Mike Hunter writes in the third of his six part series on health system issues.
29 Oct 2024
Today's Letters to the Editor from readers cover topics including the new Dunedin hospital.
28 Oct 2024
Spending will save the health system money in the long run, Ian Breeze writes.
27 Oct 2024
There are “almost certainly” more infrastructure cost bombshells to come, Infrastructure Minister Chris Bishop says, as the Government continues to grapple with the fallout from the Interislander ferry and Dunedin Hospital overruns.
25 Oct 2024
25 Oct 2024
A 'mess' in the oversight of Dunedin hospital's big build came at a crucial time While a fix was put in, key people failed to be told It took months to check if the fix worked, then a $200m cost blowout hit.
25 Oct 2024
A South Otago mother says the region should not be forced to choose whose loved ones miss out on healthcare to cut the budget for the Dunedin Hospital rebuild.
25 Oct 2024
It was a tour with a difference for Chris Hipkins in Dunedin on Friday. The Labour leader was taken for a ride in Cliff, a former ambulance turned campaign vehicle for the “Save Our Southern Hospital” campaign.
24 Oct 2024
Southland and Invercargill’s mayors and councillors hit the streets in Invercargill CBD on Wednesday to encourage people to voice their opinion about the Dunedin Hospital rebuild.
23 Oct 2024
Families throughout the South will be severely compromised by proposed cuts to the new Dunedin hospital, a South Otago mother says.
23 Oct 2024
A former leader of the new Dunedin hospital project is urging the government to abandon the "wild goose chase" of retrofitting the old hospital.
22 Oct 2024
"Uninformed and unintelligent," cuts to the new Dunedin Hospital could be fatal according to a top specialist.
22 Oct 2024
More than 40 clinical directors across the southern region have written to the government warning it of the risks in changing the Dunedin Hospital rebuild.
22 Oct 2024
In part two of a six-part series on health, Mike Hunter considers how to count beds in a hospital.
22 Oct 2024
The idea of retrofitting Dunedin’s existing hospital is already “dead in the water”, the former chair of the Southern Partnership Group Pete Hodgson says.
19 Oct 2024
A MUCH-DELAYED call on the future form of a key roading link to Dunedin’s planned new hospital is now set to be made next year. Transport planners and consultants have been developing options since 2022 for making St Andrew St safer and more suitable for pedestrians.
19 Oct 2024
A campaign is starting this morning to push for the fit-for-purpose hospital in Dunedin that the government had promised. Mayor Jules Radich says the hospital project is vital to the whole Southern region. The city council has dubbed a new awareness-raising campaign "Ambulance Cliff" as a reminder of what local communities want to avoid.
19 Oct 2024
The bean counters have been at work again. This was Dunedin Mayor Jules Radich’s first thought upon hearing the Government was considering scaling back the Dunedin hospital rebuild, which was to be the largest ever health infrastructure investment in New Zealand.
18 Oct 2024
Politicians and government officials will get a sign of the South’s support for the new Dunedin hospital project on their daily drive. A billboard imploring the government to build the hospital to the specifications promised has been installed in Wellington on the northern motorway to Kapiti Coast.
18 Oct 2024
Members of the public wanting to Save Our Southern Hospital are being encouraged to help fuel the campaign, Mayor of Dunedin Jules Radich says.
17 Oct 2024
Dunedin's Cliff the Ambulance has hit the road as the city council's Save Our Southern Hospital campaign ramps up. Ministers are waiting for officials to report back with options to reduce costs in the Dunedin Hospital build after a budget blowout, with cuts, delays or upgrading the old hospital site possibly on the cards. While they wait, Cliff's travelling the lower South Island to encourage people to demand that there are no cuts.
17 Oct 2024
"Cliff" the ambulance is on the road. The modified ambulance will be travelling through the South as part of a campaign for the new Dunedin hospital, which Dunedin Mayor Jules Radich is now rebranding as the "southern region hospital".
17 Oct 2024
The campaign to stop the downgrading of the planned Southern Region tertiary hospital in Dunedin is ready to roll across the south.
17 Oct 2024
Dunedin's mayor says the city needs the fit-for-purpose hospital the government had promised, not a cut-price ambulance at the bottom of the cliff.
17 Oct 2024
A last minute scramble to cut costs from the new Dunedin hospital has been completed and includes the option of reducing the floor size, the Otago Daily Times understands.
16 Oct 2024
PLANS to create a safer environment for pedestrians around the new Dunedin hospital site have been thrown into some doubt by the government. Its approach to speed limits could prevent it from bringing in a lower limit for traffic flowing between the planned inpatient and outpatient buildings, it emerged at a Dunedin City Council meeting yesterday.
16 Oct 2024
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has been accused of having "no idea" about Dunedin issues after a second fumble in a matter of weeks.
16 Oct 2024
More than 40 clinical directors across the southern region have written to the government warning it of the risks in changing the Dunedin Hospital rebuild.
16 Oct 2024
When the funding of essential social services is cut, as with the case of Dunedin’s new hospital, let us welcome a broader examination of taxation policy to address what is so obviously required, Nick Loughnan writes.
15 Oct 2024
Health New Zealand says it is on track to spend $2 billion on construction and other capital projects this financial year.
15 Oct 2024
Joint venture projects with the private sector offer a pathway to the construction of more fit-for-purpose hospitals than the state alone has been delivering, Invercargill mayor Nobby Clark believes.
02 Oct 2024
A Māori medical student at the University of Otago University says cutting back on the new Dunedin Hospital will have a huge impact across Otago and Southland.
02 Oct 2024
Today on Politics Wednesday Ginny Andersen and Mark Mitchell joined Heather du Plessis-Allan to discuss the biggest stories of the week so far.
02 Oct 2024
An estimated 35,000 people have marched through the streets of Dunedin, outraged by government plans to downgrade the city’s new hospital project due to budget blowouts.
02 Oct 2024
Invercargill’s mayor says he can wear many hats on the issue of the Dunedin Hospital rebuild – that of a mayor, as president of the Southland Kidney Society, and as an inpatient through open-heart and cancer surgery.
02 Oct 2024
The focus of the They Save We Pay - Hospital Cuts Hurt campaign has now shifted to flooding government ministers with postcards "urging them to do the right thing", Dunedin Mayor Jules Radich says.