Officials pull back curtain on Whitehorse General Hospitals $1.1B expansion plans

The UConn Hospital Corporation is sharing details on expansion plans for Whitehorse General Hospital. Officials say the total estimated cost is about $1.1 billion. Billion Dollars. MLA's questioned hospital officials in the Legislative Assembly on Monday afternoon. Dana Hatherly has those details. The hospital expansion project is in the early planning stage. Pamela Hine chairs the corporation's board of trustees. She says plans include 56 new inpatient beds, 32 of those medical, and 24 surgical. It also promises four new operating rooms and eight new intensive care unit beds, and capacity to repurpose existing spaces for different uses. Hine says about 500 more workers are needed to run the expanded hospital. The corporation's CEO, Tiffany Boyd, says early work involves relocating the city's water main, parking and site preparations. Maternity ward renovations are expected to start this spring. Overall, officials say it could take five to seven years to complete the expansion. Dana Hatherly, CBC News, Whitehorse.