Thanks to the Ghana Investment Infrastructure Fund, the African country recently secured $100 million to realize Agenda 111, which will see the creation of more than 100 hospitals in the next year. The project aims to significantly ramp up the quality of healthcare across the country at the district level in pursuit of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goal Three to promote well-being at all ages.
So who will oversee the design of the new hospitals? None other than David Adjaye, the British-Ghanaian architect whose award-winning firm maintains offices in Accra, London, and New York, and has masterminded marquee projects such as the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C. According to a statement from the firm, Agenda 111 will “transform Ghana’s medical system by establishing unparalleled access to healthcare facilities” in the country. The initiative will realize 101 district hospitals, seven regional hospitals, two psychiatric facilities, and the redevelopment of the Accra Psychiatric Hospital.
The firm’s design concept “merges 21st-century technology with a contextual and holistic approach crucial to the delivery of state-of-the-art healthcare.” Each 91,000-square-foot facility will have a similar layout—single-story blocks within a walled campus—and contain emergency rooms with pediatric, maternity, and surgical wards. The blocks face a central courtyard and will be surrounded by green space to forge an atmosphere of healing. They’ll also be built from prefabricated elements in order to reduce carbon impact. “By approaching the hospital as more than just a place for the provision of medical services,” Adjaye explains, “the design scheme aims to unlock the potential of this ambitious initiative by repositioning the hospital as a piece of community infrastructure that embodies sustainability, efficiency, and provides green spaces to facilitate healing.”
