Tariq A. Al-Maeena
Marshall McLuhan, a brilliant yet controversial thinker is regarded by many as the father of mass media and communications. A charismatic individual, McLuhan’s acute analysis of the changing face of communication soon earned him the title of “the prophet of the new information age.”
In 1964 he wrote a book “Understanding media” that contained a paradoxical phrase that became universally known to a new generation of students embarking on a career in mass media. That phrase, “the medium is the message” has been widely studied and hotly debated at many a college campus to this day.
It seems that many of our public service figures have somewhat not fully grasped the significance of his McLuhan’s message and continue to feed the general public information that is nothing short of bewildering.
There was a report in this paper last month that made me remember Marshall McLuhan. The head of Jeddah Health Affairs was reported as saying to the media that a new billion medical city costing about SR2 billion was “only one of the new health projects to be built in Jeddah.”
He added that the Health Ministry had completed the 500-bed King Abdullah Hospital complex which had cost some SR362 million. Among the various other projects in the works or approved were:
A SR310 million hospital is planned for construction in east Jeddah. It will have 300 beds, and furnishings worth an additional SR180 million, as well as a SR150 million ER center with 200 beds.
A children and maternity hospital with 400 beds estimated to cost some SR379 million is currently being built in north Jeddah. It will also get a SR150 million dormitory for its staff.
The spokesman went on to add that a new SR65 million medical wing at Al-Oyoun (Eye) Hospital was in the works as well as a SR70 million recovery shelter for psychiatric health. In addition, new health centers “are being built in various Jeddah districts and rural areas, taking the total number to 32. King Fahd Hospital now has 270 new beds at its new SR97 million medical wing. Recently approved projects include a SR25 million dental center in Al-Laith with 25 clinics in the area along with a SR72 million refurbishment of Al-Laith hospital.’
The report included the various projects being offered for tender, consisting of a SR14.5 million tuberculosis hospital, a SR70 million dentist center at King Abdulaziz Hospital with 100 clinics and a SR20 million regional laboratory as well as a blood bank.
Projects that had been approved in previous budgets but had yet to start construction for some unexplained reasons included a SR50- million dormitory for employees of King Fahd Hospital and a SR250 million psychiatric hospital with 500 beds.
The use of media for such proclamations has been standard fare for many public officials and captures quite a few headlines in our many daily newspapers. Yet how much of it is truthful or real is often blurred and swept away in a sea of broken promises and construction delays.
I have personally witnessed how dormant the structure of the King Abdullah Hospital in north Jeddah had remained for decades for unexplained reasons. I have also witnessed how substandard the quality of medical treatment is at some of our public medical institutions. Complaints against such from irate residents over the years could fill volumes of an encyclopedia that may look good on a book case but offer little in value.
Talk, more talk and much more talk is what the medium has slowly transformed itself into. These billions and millions being freely quoted give me a headache. Anyone on a podium uses it as a platform to sell to the public what their eyes fail to see.
The Ministry of Health is a vital institution for the country. It is better if there was more in the way of deeds and less talk for the benefit of the public. Substance over rhetoric may bring the medium with the message.
— Tariq A. Al-Maeena can be reached at talmaeena@aol.com and followed at @talmaeena
