However, Authorities Term The Deaths As ‘Routine’
Hyderabad: The 50-day junior doctors’ strike has claimed a heavy price, with as many as 24 deaths that occurred between Friday night and Saturday morning acrossthestate,being attributed to the paralysed emergency services at staterun hospitals. Seventeen deaths were reported from three tertiary care hospitals in Hyderabad__six each from Gandhi and Osmania General Hospital (OGH) and of five new-born babies at Niloufer Hospital. Five deaths were reportedin Kurnool.Visakhapatnam and Bhadrachalam accounted for one each. However, state health authorities, as expected, termed the deaths as routine’ and said they were no way related to doctors’ boycott of emergency duties.
There were heart-rending scenes of patients suffering in front of emergency wards at government hospitals as doctors stayed away from emergency duties even as patients, most of them poor, were being turned away to private facilities. Chaotic scenes were witnessed at the casualty wards andintensivecareunitsofvarious departments at the hospitals in Visakhapatnam, Vijayawada, Guntur, Kakinada, Tirupati, Anantapur, Kurnool and Warangal. Vital casualty wards, intensive care units of various departments, in-patient and outpatient wards at all the teaching hospitals werebadly hit due to the strike. Victims of accidents and burns were the worst hit with no doctor available in the emergency wing.
Pavan Singh, a Dhoolpet resident was at OGH trying to find a doctor for his relative. “We were referred from the Chest Hospital. My brother-inlaw developed severe swelling on his left leg and had other complications. He was unable to walk. We brought him in an ambulance to the hospital but were told that doctors had left for theday.”
Also at OGH was a 12-member group that had met with an accident near Mahbubnagar while returning from Tirupati. Thevictimswithbleedinginjurieswere rushedtoOGHon Saturday afternoon. Of the 12, an old couple, Narsamma and Narsi Reddy, were lying on stretchersoutsidethecasualty. Pvt hospitals making most of medicos’ strike
A7-year-old boy in the group had suffered internal injuries and was crying in pain even as his mother said that they were directed to the orthopaedic department from the emergency but found no doctor there. “Now, we have no choice but to go to a private hospital,” she said.
Boycotting the emergency services since Friday evening are 2,800 junior doctors across 10 teaching hospitals in the state who constitute 95 per cent of the workforce in the emergency medical care. Their demand: a 40 percent hike in stipend and reduction in the compulsory service in rural areas from three years to one year, upgradation of emergency care infrastructure and deployment of special protection force at the teaching hospitals.
Earlier, the state government had formed a cabinet subcommittee comprising health minister K Murali Mohan, primary education minister S Shailajanath, finance minister Anam Ramnarayan Reddy and industries minister J Geeta Reddy to look into their demands and find a solution. During the 50-day period, the medicos were called for talks at least four times, but they failed on all occasions. In fact, soon after the doctors started boycotting emergencies on Friday evening, they were invited for talks but the impasse continued.
The private sector is predictably benefiting from the standoff. According to sources, there has been a 15-20 per cent rise in the number of patients rushing to small hospitals and nursing homes. “Patients are looking for an alternative. Whenever there is a strike, they are diverted to the private sector but the problem is they are poor patients. With the strike stretching for such a long time where will these patients go? They have come back to us,” said the managing director of a nursing home.
Hospital authorities said they were using the services of non-clinical specialty staff, but it proved inadequate in tackling the flow of patients. OGH superintendent Dr K Ramdas said that daily, 10-12 deaths are reported at the 1400-bedded hospital. This is routine and there has been no additional casualties due to the strike, he said. Similarly, Dr S Mahaboob, superintendent, Gandhi Hospital, said that out of the six deaths, one was ‘brought dead’ to the hospital. Dr D Ranganadh of Niloufer Hospital stated that all the five babies were just born and underweight.
At King George Hospital in Vizag, all medical services were hit due to the strike by junior doctors, who account for 350 of the total 500 doctors working there. On Saturday, from the average 90 operations that the doctors perform everyday, only about 25 were performed and that too only the very serious cases were being taken up.
The marathon strike, that was started in Vizag by medicos who had failed to get their stipend for several months, subsequently spread across the state and led to a complete breakdown of healthcare services in the public sector.
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