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67-year-old dies of Covid, family claims Lok Nayak denied him bed
New Delhi: The family of a 67-year-old Covid-19 patient has alleged that he died waiting for a bed outside Delhi’s biggest dedicated health facility for the disease
New Delhi: The family of a 67-year-old Covid-19 patient has alleged that he died waiting for a bed outside Delhi’s biggest dedicated health facility for the disease – Lok Nayak hospital. Lakhjeet Singh was brought to the hospital on Thursday morning with fever, according to his family.
“He had fever since May 26. After three days of taking medicines, we went to (a private) hospital, where they did an X-ray and said there was chest infection. They took sample for Covid-19 and said that the reports will be available online. We got the test report on June 1 and tried to contact the hospital,” said a message from his son-in-law Mandeep Singh.
The family claimed that it went to several private and government hospitals to understand what to do next. They were advised to go to Lok Nayak hospital by the Delhi government helpline, the family said.
“So, we reached there around 6.50am. When we went to the Covid-19 block, a doctor told us to go back to the hospital where he had been tested. The patient was waiting in the car right outside the emergency. As soon as we reached back, he had an attack and fainted,” said Singh.
According to the family, after they requested the doctor, he was given oxygen but died within 15 minutes.
Lok Nayak hospital, however, has refuted the claim.
“The first tweet regarding alleged refusal to admit the patient was posted at 08:05 am and subsequently at 09:08 am the news of the patient’s passing away was shared. Upon investigation of the incident, it was found that the Lok Nayak hospital’s auto-generated electronic casualty record had registered the patient in question as brought dead at 7:37 am,” the hospital said in a release.
“The hospital wishes to clarify that the patient was not refused admission and was examined by the doctors upon being brought in,” the release said.
