BENGALURU: A 34-year-old pregnant woman from Sikkim was thrown out of a nursing home on Sunday afternoon while she was suffering labour pain, as the hospital suspected that she had Covid-19. She has been visiting the nursing home in Viveknagar since the beginning of her pregnancy. Two days ago, they took the woman’s swab test but did not reveal the results. Rosline Gomes, a close friend of the family, said, “She developed labour pain at around 11.30 am on Sunday and her family took her to the nursing home. Around 2.30 pm, they sent her out of the hospital, while she was in severe pain. They said they cannot treat someone with suspected Covid-19 symptoms. She was made to sit on a chair outside the nursing home. She was there for six hours and no doctor or nurse attended to her.”
“How can the nursing home be so negligent and throw out a woman in labour pain? They could have referred her to another hospital or guided us. Or they could have let her deliver and then shifted her to another hospital for Covid-19 treatment. This is a serious issue and is no way to treat a patient, irrespective of if they have coronavirus or not,” Rosline said.
“It is their responsibility to take care of her. We were all panicking and began searching for hospitals to take her to,” Rosline said, adding, “Around 8 pm we took her to a private hospital in Malleswaram and she delivered a healthy baby boy on Monday morning.” When this hospital contacted the nursing home, they found that the result was positive. The family also got a call from BBMP later confirming the positive result. As they were unable to afford the Malleswaram hospital charges, Rosline shifted the woman to Vani Vilas Hospital later on Monday night.
Pankaj Kumar Pandey, Commissioner for Health and Family Welfare, said, “We have a chain of maternity hospitals and will get in touch with them. They have to reserve 50 per cent of their beds for Covid-19 patients. As for this case, we will look into what action we can take.”Minister of Medical Education Dr K Sudhakar recently said that criminal action will be taken against private hospitals for denying treatment to Covid-19 patients. He was, however, unreachable for comment.