SALEM: After videos of rats scampering about an Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of a major government hospital in Salem went viral, the hospital administration swung into action. By the end of Tuesday, the staff of the Government Mohan Kumaramangalam Medical College Hospital (GMKMCH) had managed to catch at least 50 rats.
The videos, which have been circulated on social media for two days, were taken by relatives of patients admitted in the ICU of the Super Speciality hospital part of the GMKMCH. They showed rats gaily scampering across the ICU and running up and down along oxygen pipelines even as patients rested on the adjacent beds.
On condition of anonymity, relatives of some patients alleged that the rats were entering the unit through holes in walls and the false ceiling. They also alleged that even water or clean toilets were not available in the speciality hospital, putting them to great hardship.
“We have asked doctors and nurses to help regarding this, but no action has been taken,” relatives said.
A Asokan, president of the Federation of Consumer Organizations Tamil Nadu and Pondicherry, pointed out that rats running around the ICU meant government hospitals were becoming a source of infectious diseases. He pointed out that the poor and middle class were dependent on government hospitals.
“We cannot even imagine what might happen if these rats damaged the oxygen lines. It could even lead to the death of patients," he said, urging the government to look into the matter and provide funds needed to improve the hospital’s infrastructure.
GMKMCH Dean R Balajinathan, on Tuesday morning, told The New Indian Express that he’d seen the videos. "I do not know when it happened. But we inquired and found rats roaming about in that ICU in the night hours. We have arranged to catch these rats and have set rat traps in 40 places in the hospital premises aside from putting out rat cakes,” he said, adding that the toilets were also cleaned.
He claimed that rats entered the hospital through drainage channels in the rainy season and because of garbage dumped near the hospital by roadside eateries.