KURNOOL: Lack of proper fire safety measures in Covid hospitals in the district poses a grave risk to patients as most of them do not have the mandatory No Objection Certificate (NOC) from the fire services and disaster management department. The hospitals which do not have NOCs include Kurnool Government General Hospital (GGH), State Covid Hospital, Nandyal District Hospital and Adoni Area Hospital.
The district administration has arranged 1,260 beds in 18 government and private hospitals to treat Covid cases.Three government and two private hospitals do not have NOC. One private hospital is running with just conditional NOC due to inadequate fire safety equipment, District Fire Officer (DFO) V Sreenivasa Reddy told TNIE.
The DFO said they issued notices to the hospitals to install fire safety equipment and obtain NOC from the fire services department. In Kurnool GGH, 500 beds have been arranged for Covid patients. Though all the wings in the hospital possess fire safety equipment, it is yet to be operationalised to get NOC. The 60-bed Nandyal District Hospital and 85-bed Adoni Area Hospital, which are exclusively for Covid cases, do not have fixed firefighting equipment as per fire safety norms. Similarly, Vishwa Bharati Hospital and Sri Gayatri Hospital are yet to get NOC from the fire services department.
The 100-bed Santhiram Hospital in Nandyal is being run with conditional NOC, the DFO said.
Speaking about other hospitals, including Covid and non- Covid hospitals, the DFO said 176 private hospitals have been issued NOCs against the total 250 across the district so far. “We have issued notices to these hospitals. The situation at the three government hospitals has been taken to the notice of District Collector G Veerapandian for further action,’’ Sreenivasa Reddy said.
He, however, said in the wake of fire mishaps in Covid hospitals at some places in the country, they inspected all the hospitals and created an awareness among staff about fire safety. Two personnel of the fire services department have been deployed at the hospitals and Covid Care Centres in Kurnool, Nandyal, Adoni and Yemmiganur.’ The Covid Care Centres set up in TIDCO housing colonies have been provided fire equipment to thwart any untoward incident, he said.