E-Paper
Medical facilities in UP’s small towns, villages are ‘Ram bharose’: Allahabad HC
The Allahabad high court's stinging comment against the UP government came on the "casual approach" in Meerut where a patient went missing and his body disposed of as an unidentified person.
PRAYAGRAJ: The Allahabad high court on Monday reprimanded the Uttar Pradesh government over the “casual approach of doctors and paramedical staff” in Meerut where a patient went missing and later his body was disposed of as unidentified, and said that the smaller cities and villages in the state can only be “Ram bharose (at God’s mercy)”.
Taking serious note of the incident where a patient went missing from the Meerut district hospital and then disposed of his body as unidentified, the court said, “If this is the state of affairs of treatment at medical college in the city like Meerut then the entire medical system of the state pertaining to the smaller cities and villages can only be taken to be like a famous Hindi saying ‘Ram bharose’.” The court said it is a case of ‘high degree carelessness’.
“A patient is admitted to the hospital in an absolute care of doctors and paramedical staff and if the 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 court observed.
The bench comprising justice Siddhartha Varma and justice Ajit Kumar passed the order in a suo motu PIL on ‘conditions of quarantine centres and for providing better treatment to corona positives’ in the state of Uttar Pradesh.
The court directed additional chief secretary (Medical and Health), Uttar Pradesh to file an affidavit fixing responsibility in the matter. The bench took the example of district Bijnor as a test case to assess the overall health care system in smaller cities and rural areas of the state and after going through Covid testing data related to Bijnor, the bench expressed its dissatisfaction to the number of tests conducted in Bijnor between March 31, 2021 and May 12 , 2021.
The bench said that in the population of 32 lakhs if the testing is done of only 1200 persons per day then the situation is not happy. The manner in which the pandemic has hit the rural areas of the State, the district administration is required to have a robust way of conducting tests.
The bench directed the state government to immediately improve and increase the testing methods of the rural population and the population of small cities and towns and also provide sufficient health care infrastructure in such cities of state.
The bench then said that we are under ‘serious threat of its third wave, hence, we need to vaccinate each and every individual in the country and we need to have an excellent medical infrastructure.
The court has fixed May 22 as the next date of hearing.
