CARROLLTON, Ala. (WIAT) — Officials are still fighting to reopen the Pickens County Medical Center, which was closed down in 2020.

Carrollton Mayor Mickey Walker has been leading the charge to reopen the facility. He is hoping the legislature and Governor Kay Ivey will support the process to open the doors of the hospital.

“We have got to get the funding to get this hospital open,” Walker said. “It’s already passed in the House and goes to the Senate for $8 million to build a child adolescent ward which will help fund the hospital and we want to get that started.”

Vicky McCrory, a paramedic for Pickens County Ambulance Service, is hoping for the same results.

McCrory responded to downtown Carrollton for a woman who suffered a heart attack and died. She believes the patient might have survived if the hospital was still open.

“The hospital is only a mile away and had [it] been open, she would have had a better chance of survival,” McCrory said.

McCrory says she has to transport patients to Columbus, Mississippi, or to DCH in Tuscaloosa, which are both 40 miles from Carrollton. According to her, at least five patients died before making it to those hospitals last year.