Denied test at Ghaziabad hospital, 65-year-old Delhi woman dies in ambulance

A 65-year-old woman from Delhi died in an ambulance at the MMG District Hospital on Wednesday afternoon after health care workers at the Sanjay Nagar combined district hospital told to go there for her Covid-19 test, her family alleged

A 65-year-old woman from Delhi died in an ambulance at the MMG District Hospital on Wednesday afternoon after health care workers at the Sanjay Nagar combined district hospital told to go there for her Covid-19 test, her family alleged.

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The dead woman was identified as Sunita Kakkar, resident of Krishna Nagar.

Sandeep Chaddha, her son-in-law who took her to Ghaziabad on Wednesday, said, “After not getting beds in Delhi on Tuesday, we turned to Ghaziabad and visited several hospitals but could not find a bed. We then reached the testing booth at Sanjay Nagar and the staff there asked us to go to MMG Hospital.”

At MMG hospital, her sample was taken up around 12.15pm and she died around 12.30pm, he said. “Her oxygen supply in the ambulance had exhausted by then,” said Chaddha. “If the test would have been conducted at Sanjay Nagar booth, she would have been saved. Instead, we had to suffer traffic to reach MMG Hospital, which is about 5kms away. When her rapid antigen test report arrived, she tested positive for Covid.”

CMO Dr NK Gupta said he will inquire into the incident.

“We will get it inquired,” he added.

The UP government recently issued directions on April 17 about “presumptive patients” and said that those having Covid-like symptoms but testing negative in reports, should be treated like Covid patients.

When contacted, district magistrate Ajay Shankar Pandey did not respond to calls and did not respond to detailed query sent to him about the issue.

In another incident, a 62-year-old man from Vinod Nagar (East) in Delhi collapsed on a road in Vaishali on Monday evening after his son took him on a bike to hospitals in Ghaziabad in order to get him admitted.

The state control room records indicated that the Ghaziabad district recorded a single day high of a total of eight deaths on Wednesday. With this, the overall tally of Covid-related deaths has gone up to 117. Overall 15 deaths have taken place so far in the month of April.

“Of the eight deaths, two took place at Santosh Hospital while five took place at Rama Hospital. The patients were in critical condition. At our end, we are trying best to give treatment to patients,” CMO Dr NK Gupta, said.