KINGSTON, Jamaica — Jamaica will start providing free health care to all adult citizens next week, requiring a step-up in hiring and medical supplies.

A little less than a year after the government introduced free health care for children, overwhelming hospitals and clinics, adults will be extended the same coverage beginning April 1 — creating a need for at least 1,500 additional nurses, doctors and pharmacists, Health Minister Rudyard Spencer said Friday.

"Failure is not an option," Spencer told reporters, noting that clinics will extend their hours to serve an anticipated jump in demand for service.

About 4,400 people work in more than 60 public hospitals and clinics across Jamaica, where officials have posted fliers in hospital hallways and taken out newspaper ads to recruit new employees.

The government says it has set aside US$54 million to fund the new plan — although Spencer estimates the cost will run about US$24 million in the first year.

Specifics of how this poor Caribbean nation will pay for the programme are still unclear, but a proposed 2008 budget calls for a total health care outlay of some US$389 million (euro246 million) — making it the second largest item after national security.

Hospitals and pharmacies will also need to stock up on medicine and other supplies, said Dr. Rosemarie Wright-Pascoe, president of Jamaica's Medical Association.

"If all of this is not put in place," she said, "there will be problems."

Jamaica last May extended free public health services — including surgeries and drug prescriptions — to all Jamaicans 18 and younger.

Hospitals and clinics buckled under the unexpected surge. Parents complained their children had to wait as long as 24 hours for care, and some scuffled with nurses.

Delesia Honeywell, a 30-something patient waiting to receive sickle cell treatment at Grants Pen clinic in southern Jamaica last Wednesday, worried that the plan will create new backlogs.

"I don't believe in too much freeness," Honeywell said. "It puts pressure on the system."