Discussing the worst state of medical facilities in rural and small cities of Uttar Pradesh, the Allahabad High Court on Monday had used a famous Hindi term for the state’s coronavirus condition as - "Ram Bharose" (at God's mercy).
The observation was made by a bench composed of Justices Siddharth Varma and Ajit Kumar who was hearing an ongoing plea that demands better care for patients infected with Coronavirus in the state. The bench referred to UP’s entire medical system particularly to smaller cities and villages as the popular Hindi saying 'Ram Bharose' (at the mercy of God) ".
The observation by the court came while it took serious note of patients going missing from the Meerut district hospital and later being declared as an unidentified one. The court noted that the patient Santosh Kumar was admitted to the Meerut district hospital and had collapsed in a restroom. He was then brought on a stretcher and efforts were made to revive him, but he died. The doctors and medical staff then disposed of the person’s body as "unidentified".
"It comes out to be a case of high degree (of) carelessness on the part of the doctors who were on night duty," it has been underlined.
Observing the state of medical care in Uttar Pradesh which has been receiving criticism from across all political parties, the court stated: "So far as the medical infrastructure is concerned, in these few months we have realised that in the manner it stands today, it is very delicate, fragile and debilitated."
The court further added: "When it cannot meet the medical requirements of our people in normal times, it had to collapse in the face of the present pandemic."
The bench during the hearing cited an example from western UP's Bijnor district and noted the state government’s submissions, it said: "To our utter surprise there is no level-3 hospital in district Bijnor. The three government hospitals have only 150 beds, whereas the total number of BIPAP machines are 5 and High Flow Nasal Cannula, is only 2".
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"If we take the population of rural areas to be 32 lakh since there are only 10 Community Health Centers or CHCs, one health centre has the load of 3 lakh people and against 3 lakh people it has only 30 beds. Meaning thereby, one CHC can cater the need of health care to only 0.01 per cent of the population and there is no BIPAP machine (a type of ventilator) or High Flow Nasal Cannula available."
"Only 17 oxygen concentrators are available with 250 oxygen cylinders against 300 beds. There is no description as to what the capacity of oxygen cylinders is and whether in CHC there are trained hands to operate these oxygen cylinders and concentrators," the court further observed.
“If doctors and paramedical staff adopt such casual approach and show carelessness in the performance of their duty, then it is a case of serious misconduct because it is something like playing with the lives of innocent people. The state needs to take stern action against those responsible,” the court observed.
The court has directed the state government to provide sufficient health care infrastructure in compliance with its direction issued earlier and on vaccination procedure, it suggested that big business houses who take benefits under taxation laws by donating to various religious organisations may be asked to divert their funds for vaccines.
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Since the eruption of the second covid wave in the country, Uttar Pradesh has been reporting more than 20,000 fresh cases every day. Even though the state government has denied claims of oxygen shortage or other resources, critics alleged patients were struggling due to a lack of proper and basic medical facilities. On the other hand, shocking images of covid dead bodies were found in villages near the banks of River Ganga.