She said the five expressions of interest had been received from the market for the AU$2.03bn (£1.32bn) Sunshine Coast University Hospital (SCUH) public private partnership (PPP) project.
"We are delighted with this response,” she said. “Recent healthcare PPPs in Australia attracted up to four bidders at the EOI stage, so we are very pleased to have received five responses from major players in this sector. It is a clear demonstration of the industry's support for the Sunshine Coast University Hospital project.”
Evaluations of the expressions of interest will now begin, with tender documents due to be issued to short-listed bidders in August.
The PPP will see Queensland Health enter into a 25-year procurement contract with a private consortium to design, finance, construct and maintain the hospital buildings she said. The hospital will open with 450 beds in 2016 growing to 738 beds by 2021.
“This will be the biggest hospital building project in the country when construction gets under way in early 2013,” she said. More than 2,000 are expected work on site during construction.
In addition to the SCUH, the Queensland Government signed contracts with Ramsay Health Care in April this year for the provision of a 200 bed private hospital to open in 2013 on the SCUH site.
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