HYDERABAD: There seems to be no end to the horrifying stories coming out of Gandhi Hospital, the designated Covid treatment facility, where the families of patients are being kept in the dark about the death of their loved ones.
The latest victim of the renowned hospital’s negligence is a family from Muradh Nagar near Mehdipatnam. The already grief-stricken family was left shell-shocked when, after a 30-hour agony, they were informed that the body of their kin, a 37-year-old man who died at the hospital, was handed over to another family from Pahadi Shareef. Incidentally, the wrong family even buried the body.
Speaking to Express, one of the deceased patient’s family members, said: “On Tuesday night, my uncle was shifted from a private hospital to Gandhi Hospital for treatment. On Wednesday morning, we got a call saying that he had passed away.
However, when we went to hospital and searched, we could not find his body. Only the next day afternoon, we got to know that the body was taken by another family to Pahadi Shareef and it has been buried.” Describing the agonising hours spent at Gandhi Hospital searching for the body, the dead person’s brother speaking to the media, said: “On Wednesday around 7 am, we got information that he died. We immediately left for Gandhi Hospital.
It was only around 5 pm we were called for identification of body.” “When we went there, we did not find his body. We searched a lot but to no avail. The hospital staff did not give any information. We tried to reach hospital authorities through various public representatives but even that did not help,” he added.
However, hospital officials denied any wrongdoing on their part.
A senior official from the hospital’s forensic department, said: “The body of a patient is never handed over to a family without identification by kin of the patient. However, in many Covid-19 cases, even the closest of kin are afraid to come close to the body to identify it properly and stand far away during identification. As a result, there have been instances of kin mistaking one body for another.”