NASSAU, The Bahamas — The Ministry of Health and Wellness (MoHW) received a donation from the US Northern Command of equipment and vehicles approximating almost $400,000. The donation was received by the Minister of Health and Wellness, the Hon. Dr. Michael Darville, joined by the Minister of State for the ministry, the Hon. Owen Wells on June 30, 2026 at the ministry’s headquarters.
Items donated: Generators, small flatbed trucks, golf carts, cardiac monitors, and digital ECG machines.
The generators will close the gap in equipment assessed during the recent hurricane preparedness review exercise. They will be sent to clinics and health facilities that require them in a bid to strengthen business continuity and service delivery resilience.
Vehicles will reduce the challenge of timely transporting of MoHW Maintenance Department workers to different locations on the same day, the collection and delivery of goods and medical equipment by the Supplies Unit, and the response time for Biomedical Engineering team to address maintenance concerns with medical equipment in clinics across New Providence.
The vehicles will expand and improve the ability to transport medical equipment and supplies and support transportation requirements for maintenance and biomedical support services to clinics in New Providence. They will be made available to the Ministry of Health & Wellness, the Department of Public Health and the Public Hospitals Authority.
The golf carts will increase the ability of the department to meet the transportation needs of healthcare workers in smaller communities in the cays. They will be distributed among three of the following locations — Harbour Island, Spanish Wells, Bimini, or one of the cays in Abaco — to support ground transportation for healthcare staff there.
The medical equipment will strengthen and expand the scope of services delivered in DPH community clinics with ECG machines being situated on each major Family Island and in the polyclinics. The equipment will augment the Ministry’s current drive to improve access to laboratory and imaging diagnostics in these locations, which is critical to raising the minimum standard of services in pursuit of strengthening The Bahamas’s universal access and universal coverage for medical services.
The cardiac monitors have already been put into service, supporting the management of patients who present with cardiovascular concerns as they are treated or stabilised for transfer to a tertiary institution for further management.
The ECG machines will be sent to major DPH installations in New Providence and the Family Islands.
