Nurses are prepared to take their fight to Parliament to get the government to keep its promises and not "downscale" Dunedin’s new hospital.
Dr Levy has said the project could be "downscaled", if required.
New Zealand Nurses Organisation delegate Linda Smillie said Dr Levy’s remarks were "deeply disappointing".
"Any scaling back would have a direct impact on not only the services the hospital could provide, but also the ability to recruit new staff.
"Dr Levy is new to his role as commissioner and we hope his remark was ‘off the cuff’ and that he reconsiders what he has said."
Ms Smillie said the union could consider reviving the "They Save — We Pay" campaign and presenting the 23,000 signatures of support to Parliament.
"The government had promised the hospital would be built to full specification and we need them to keep that promise.
Association of Salaried Medical Specialists chief executive Sarah Dalton said Dr Levy’s recent remarks were "hugely concerning".
"Short-term thinking remains a significant problem in our health system," Ms Dalton said. "Successive governments are scared of the big numbers when it comes to hospitals."
The Otago Daily Times understands the cost of the project has ballooned to more than $2 billion.
"New hospitals can take a decade from whoa to go — of course, there are going to be cost increases."
There needed to be an external review of the way health was funded, she said.
"We hope New Zealand could be a bit smarter about this and have some real objective tools and metrics for funding health — both for infrastructure and staff."
Building the hospital to the promised specifications should be the "absolute minimum".
"We’re close to two years’ away from the opening of the first building, so we need to see some commitment in terms of staffing so we’re not just shuffling the deck chairs."
Prior to the election, the government announced a $30 million boost to roll back some of the Labour government’s cuts and said it would build the hospital to the specifications originally intended.
The funding boost was to pay for the reinstatement of 23 inpatient beds, two operating theatres and the country’s first publicly owned PET scanner.
A spokeswoman for Health Minister Dr Shane Reti said "infrastructure remains important to our overall plans for health, and Dr Reti will work closely with Infrastructure Minister Chris Bishop on that".
Dr Reti did not respond to a question about whether the government supported downscaling the project.
The ODT has approached HNZ about what analysis had been done on the cost and scale of the new Dunedin hospital build; whether HNZ was considering any downsizing of the project; and how close HNZ was to signing a contract for the inpatient building.
An HNZ spokesman said: "It is early days in terms of Dr Levy’s time in the role and no decisions have been made regarding the new Dunedin hospital".
"More broadly, the budget for the project has been revised several times since the indicative business case was first approved in 2017. When delivering an infrastructure project of this scale, it is important that we monitor and manage costs."
