Gorakhpur deaths: Dr Kafeel Khan made scapegoat, say AIIMS resident doctors

The resident doctors association at AIIMS has written a letter condemning Dr Kafeel Khan’s sacking and has accused the Uttar Pradesh government of ‘gross neglect of public health’.

Resident doctors of AIIMS condemned the sacking of paediatrician Dr Kafeel Khan of Gorakhpur-based BRD Medical College Hospital on Monday, alleging that he had been made a “scapegoat” in the tragic incident in which 30 children had died within a span of 48 hours.

A woman looks after her child at the encephalitis ward of the Baba Raghav Das Hospital in Gorakhpur, on Monday.(AFP Photo)

Khan, who was the nodal officer at the state-run hospital’s paediatric department, had been hailed as a hero after he reportedly bought oxygen cylinders with his own money during the crisis.

“With great pain we have to say that once again a doctor has been made a scapegoat for the infrastructural lapse and failure of the government,” president of the resident doctors association at AIIMS, Dr Harjit Singh Bhatti, said.

The association has written a letter condemning Khan’s sacking and has also accused the Uttar Pradesh government of “gross neglect of public health.”

“If oxygen, gloves, surgical instruments and basic medicines are not available in the hospital, then who is responsible? According to the government, the doctor is responsible.

“I request politicians not to spoil this relationship between the patient and the doctor to hide their incompetency,” Bhatti said in the letter.

More than 60 children have reportedly died at the BRD Medical College Hospital over the last six days and at least 30 deaths in two days.

Many of the victims were infants admitted at the hospital’s neonatal intensive care unit.