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13 die in TN govt hospital, officials deny oxygen shortage
Chennai: Thirteen people died on Tuesday late night and wee hours on Wednesday at the Chengalpattu government medical college hospital adjoining Chennai district
Chennai: Thirteen people died on Tuesday late night and wee hours on Wednesday at the Chengalpattu government medical college hospital adjoining Chennai district. Authorities said one of them was Covid-19 positive and denied allegations of oxygen shortage. A probe is underway to find the cause of their death.
Post graduate doctors of the hospital staged a protest on Wednesday demanding more oxygen, workforce and against healthcare workers being diverted from their hospital.
Videos recorded from the hospital on the wee hours of Wednesday shows attendants of patients wailing. A woman inside the ward was seen shouting and crying saying that her husband has passed away even as a container named INOX Air Products entered the hospital premises at night.
Chengalpattu district collector A John Louis, who reviewed the situation on Tuesday night, denied reports that the deaths were due to oxygen shortage. “Oxygen supply was maintained and I was present there at that time,” Louis said. “One of them is positive, the rest tested Covid-19 negative. The Director of Medical Education is inquiring,” he told reporters earlier in the day. “I was there at the field the whole night monitoring the situation. Oxygen supply (for the patients) was not interrupted. Seven of those (13) patients got admitted yesterday,” he said, adding that the hospital has a capacity of 23,000 litres of oxygen out of which 2,900 litres is consumed per day.
The hospital dean Dr J Muthukumaran said that the patients had viral Pneumonia and some of them who had tested positive, recovered, but still had respiratory issues. “They died due to age, comorbidities and the condition of the diseases despite receiving treatment and not because of oxygen shortage,” said Muthukumaran. “At the stage of admission most of them had oxygen saturation below 80 with 50-60% lung involvement which is critical,” he said.
According to the dean, 10 of the 13 patients were on oxygen support and there was a drop in the oxygen pressure but that was still not the cause. “The same low pressure oxygen was being given to other patients including serious Covid-19 patients and at the neonatal ICU. The new born babies with respiratory problems are more vulnerable than adults with Covid-19. But there were no deaths anywhere else. We had oxygen of 10,000 kilo liters in our tank.As the oxygen was going down there was a drop in the pressure; so the drive of the oxygen was less. For this we connected 180 cylinders as a substitute until the lorry carrying liquid oxygen container came in and filled up to 7000 kilo liters. During this four-five hours oxygen was available in the tank and pipeline,” he said.
When asked about his hospital’s doctors protesting for more oxygen, the dean said that they had witnessed a drop in oxygen pressure the previous week. “There was no death then too but it was a panicky situation. Since it happened again, the doctors protested because they are worried that relatives of patients will take it out on them as they are the ones who are directly treating them.” He added that the DME, Narayana Babu has assured 100 more health staff for the hospital.
A total of 447 patients is undergoing treatment in the hospital out of which 256 are Covid-19 patients while 191 were suspected to be infected with the virus. On Tuesday, 325 patients were on oxygen support. “We are taking steps to provide an additional 72 oxygen points,” he told reporters.
“Since last night, oxygen was very low. At least 10-12 deaths have occurred but authorities are saying only one death due to Covid-19,” Nirmal, a protesting doctor, told Tamil channel Thanthi TV.
There was oxygen scarcity for the past one week in the hospital, including for about 3 hours on Tuesday night, because of which the deaths occurred, said another doctor.
Chengalpattu which is adjoining Chennai has the second highest caseload in Tamil Nadu. On May 4, Chengalpattu reported 1,608 new cases taking its active cases tally to 9,663.
