Dec. 31, 2024 Tuesday  
Rodong Sinmun
Revised Import List

Politics 2024.12.10.


Women in our country call the Pyongyang Maternity Hospital the parents’ home. The hospital is also associated with a touching story.

One February day in 1980 Chairman Kim Jong Il visited the newly built Pyongyang Maternity Hospital.

Looking round the hospital that day, the Chairman expressed satisfaction at the fact that the Pyongyang Maternity Hospital was built splendidly.

Looking up to the Chairman, officials were moved to tears as they recollected the efforts the Chairman devoted for making sure that the maternity hospital was built as a monumental edifice.

Before the onset of construction the officials concerned came up with a design of a building with 500 beds. They presumed that it was up to a world standard, as a maternity hospital in Europe noted for its size had approximately 450 beds.

500 beds―this seemed a considerable number for the officials.

However, Kim Jong Il advised that the hospital should have no less than 1 500 beds, 1 000 for mothers and 500 for babies.

His instruction shocked the officials; they were shocked further when they submitted the import list endorsement to the Chairman.

The Chairman, pointing to the list, asked them why they presumed to import such a little number of incubators.

The officials told him that it would exceed the foreign-exchange budget to increase the number of incubators and they argued that the planned number would be sufficient for the babies, premature and immature, to be born at the hospital.

After listening to their saying the Chairman said no, adding that we should buy more and we have not spared money for the good of children. And he instructed that we should consider everything necessary in equipping the maternity hospital adequately, before working out the budget.

The import list was revised immediately and therefore, thousands of sophisticated modern equipment including the huge number of pricey incubators was imported.

Like this, the Pyongyang Maternity Hospital is a house of love built thanks to such warm love of the Chairman.

Rodong Sinmun