ROURKELA: If you are critically ill for any reason other than Covid-19 or do not possess a positive test report, then you may face a tough time getting admitted to a hospital in Rourkela.
Families of at least two patients underwent such an ordeal in the last 24 hours after unsuccessfully hopping through the city’s hospitals.
Ashis Adak (32) of Bondamunda, an engineer with a private company, said his father Manoranjan (60) died at home without getting treated on Saturday evening around the same time as his RT-PCR report came negative after three days.
His father was suffering from fever and when his oxygen level dropped in the morning, he rushed him to Hi-Tech Medical College & Hospital (HTMCH), a Covid-19 hospital, but was denied admission pending Covid-19 positive report.
He found JP Hospital, another Covid facility, fully occupied and returned to HTMCH where he was unable to get his father admitted.
Then Manoranjan was taken to Shanti Memorial Hospital where too admission was denied by authorities due to lack of facilities.
The Rourkela Government Hospital (RGH) also refused to arrange ventilator or oxygen support for Manoranjan. Ashis said as a last ditch effort, he once again visited HTMCH where a doctor told him in absence of Covid-19 positive report, it was not possible to get his father admitted.
“Finally, at around 5.30 pm my father breathed his last. I will have to live with the trauma of not able to arrange treatment for him,’ a shaken Ashis said.
His is not the isolated case. Contractor Sanjay Jha said his relative Naval Chandra Jha, 40, who had tested negative for the virus arrived in the city with severe respiratory distress on Sunday afternoon.
Naval, who is from Gumla in Jharkhand, was taken to Vesaj Patel Hospital where the authorities denied him admission citing absence of ventilator support.
Sanjay then took Naval to HTMCH where he was told that no patient from Jharkhand would be admitted to the facility. His next hope was JP Hospital which was overcrowded. He tried his luck at Ispat General Hospital and CWS Hospital which did not have ventilators.
Left with no option, Naval was sent to Cuttack with plain oxygen support in the afternoon. Denying treatment to citizens from Jharkhand or other states violates the spirit of the Constitution and the nation’s federal setup, he said.
Rourkela unit Biju Yuva Janata Dal general secretary Pinku Jaiswal, who also underwent a similar ordeal rued that non-Covid patients are denied treatment on strange grounds.