MUMBAI: In a shocking incident, an 82-year-old woman from Bhusaval, who was missing for eight days from a government-run hospital at Jalgaon in Maharashtra, was found dead inside a toilet in the same hospital on Wednesday.
According to Akbar Patel, Senior Inspector at the Zillapeth police station, the Jalgaon Civil Hospital (JCH) authorities and the family had informed the police that she was missing on June 2.
The octogenarian, who was a Covid-19 patient, was admitted to the hospital on June 1. She went missing from the hospital the next day which was also registered in the district police stations. The police, hospital staffers and the family members had been searching for her since June 2.
While cleaning the hospital on June 9, the old woman's body was discovered in the bathroom of ward 7.
Earlier, this same hospital in Amalner was in the news when the medical staffers concerned had exchanged the body of a Covid-19 patient with that of a non-corona patient.
This is the second recorded case of a 'missing' Covid-19 patient found dead in the past three days, rattling the state health authorities.
On Tuesday, Mumbai Mayor Kishori Pednekar ordered an inquiry after the body of an 80-year-old male Covid-19 patient, who went missing from the Dr. B.R. Ambedkar Shatabdi Hospital in Kandivali on Sunday, was found near the Borivali station, apparently killed in a train mishap.