A video footage of a patient being brought to a government hospital on a pushcart– which is generally employed to carry garbage– in Bihar’s West Champaran district has gone viral on social media on Thursday.
In the video, about half a dozen people are seen pushing the cart, with the patient inside, before shifting her to a stretcher after reaching the sub divisional hospital in Bagaha, 70 kms north of Bettiah.
Family of the patient, identified as Kamali Devi, said they were forced to bring her to the hospital, about 7kms from their house at Malkauli near Bagaha 2, on a garbage pushcart after a rapid deterioration in her health on Wednesday evening. “She is running high fever and has developed breathlessness,” said Nathuni Bin, Kamali’s husband.
“What else can be done when the vehicles are not plying,” he asked, avoiding a direct answer to a query if he tried for the ambulance or not.
The woman’s husband was referring to absence of public transport during the ongoing lockdown in Bihar, clamped to contain the spread of Covid-19 cases during the second wave of the disease in the state.
Recently two incidents of bodies of Covid-19 patients being carried on carts owned by the civic administration in Nalanda district went viral on social media, raising questions on availability of ambulances in the state. A probe was ordered in the first of the two cases reported from Biharsharif town earlier this week.
In the present case, Bagaha’s sub divisional magistrate (SDM) Shekhar Anand said there was no need to bring the patient on a handcart. “In the course of our investigation, we came to know that the patient was not denied the ambulance. We have a good number of ambulances for service, and we want people to make use of our ambulance services for ferrying the patients,” the SDM said.
In another twist to the saga, the 45-year-old patient was found to have left the Bagaha sub division hospital without notifying the authorities, who have now declared her LAMA (left against medical advice). “She was under our treatment as she was suffering from breathlessness. But, in the morning, she was nowhere to be found in the hospital and hence she has been declared a LAMA,” said Dr. AK Tiwari, the medical officer of the hospital.