ATHENS – The Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF) Health Initiative will fund three new state-of-the-art hospitals in the cities of Komotini, Thessaloniki and Sparta, at a cost of $750 million.

The aim is to better health care outside of the Greek capital with the new facility in Thessaloniki, the country’s second-largest city, be dedicated to pediatrics and offer services in cardiology, hemodialysis, and oncology, as well as neonatal and pediatric intensive care, the foundation said.

A mental health clinic for children and adolescents will be created in an adjacent building, said Kathimerini of arguably Greece’s most important philanthropic organization with little coming from tax-free shipping oligarchs.

The Komotini hospital will be for general care and work with a network of local health care centers across Eastern Macedonia and Thrace, replacing the  Sismanogleio General Hospital, built in 1937, one of the country’s oldest.

The facility will have a photovoltaic roof to take care of most of the hospital’s electricity needs, a scheme not in wide use in Greece despite the abundant days of sun to capture solar power.

The new hospital of Sparta will replace one there on the same spot, which has been in operation since 1953 and will provide acute secondary care for  adults and children and specialized services.

Those will include medical and surgical specialties such as cardiology and urology, as well as gynecology, pediatric and critical care units and will have an adult mental health unit, with its own private facilities and outdoor spaces.

The plan is for all three hospitals to be delivered in late 2025, the foundation said. The SNF project is a joint corporation with Renzo Piano Building Workshop (RPBW) and Betaplan, the newspaper reported of the scheme.