Death stalks children here

Deep Chand, a resident of Uttar Pradesh’s Basti district, was perhaps too shocked to cry but tears rolled down his cheeks as he emerged out of the dreaded encephalitis ward of BRD Medical College in Gorakhpur, carrying the body of his 11-month-old daughter.

Deep Chand’s daughter was among 30 children, mostly new-born, who had died allegedly due to a cut off in oxygen supply at the medical college hospital in Gorakhpur, the Lok Sabha constituency of Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath.

“Why did they (doctors) admit my child if there was no oxygen,’’ an inconsolable Deep Chand kept asking. There was no one there to answer his question, only many more distraught parents like him, whose little ones had also met the same fate on August 10 and 11.

The doctors as well as the state government kept on saying that the deaths had not been caused by shortage of oxygen. Health Minister Siddharth Nath Singh virtually justified the large number of deaths by saying that it was a common feature in the month of August every year.

The minister furnished statistics of casualty in the hospital during the month of August in previous years and said that in comparison fewer deaths had taken place in August this year. ‘’A majority of patients who are admitted to the BRD Medical College hospital are in the last stage and therefore the casualty figure remains always high here...the average casualty is around 17-18 per day here,’’ he said.

The parents of the victims, however, had a different story to tell. ‘’Oxygen supply had stopped completely on that night…we were given AMBU (Artificial Manual Breathing Unit) bags and asked to pump it regularly,’’ said Vijay Bahadur of Siddharth Nagar district. Bahadur’s one-month-old daughter was also among the victims.

Manager Rajbhar, a resident of Motihari district in Bihar, who too lost his child, supported Bahadur. Rajbhar has filed a police complaint against UP ministers and bureaucrats accusing them of negligence and causing the death of his child.

Gorakhpur District Magistrate Rajiv Routela admitted in his report that oxygen supply had been disrupted for over two hours on the night of August 10 but he also denied that the deaths had taken place due to lack of oxygen.

The DM’s report, however, pointed out laxity on the part of the doctors and hospital authorities, saying that children could have been saved had the doctors been more careful and had better coordination amongst themselves.

The report, which was submitted to the state government, admitted that the stock of liquid oxygen had dipped to an alarmingly low level a couple of days before the tragedy. It said that senior officials of the hospital should have made arrangements to ensure adequate supply of the gas.

The report has also indicated financial irregularities in the purchase of oxygen gas and recommended a high-level inquiry into the matter. A probe by a high-level committee headed by the state chief secretary had already been ordered.

The UP government has suspended the principal of the medical college Dr Rajiv Kumar Mishra and shunted out the in-charge of the encephalitis ward Dr Kafeel Khan on charges of laxity.

Ironically, the tragedy occurred a day after Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath’s visit to the hospital during which he had also taken a round of the encephalitis ward.

Hospital staff entrusted with maintaining the oxygen supply pipes said that the hospital had been facing shortage of oxygen after the supplier had stopped supplying liquid oxygen because the hospital had not cleared bills amounting to nearly Rs 70 lakh.

They had written letters to the principal and other senior hospital officials warning that liquid oxygen levels were alarmingly low and there was imminent danger to the lives of patients, but the warning was ignored.

The supplier had threatened to stop supplying the oxygen cylinders if the bills were not paid immediately. A panicked hospital administration reportedly made a part payment on the morning of August 11, but by then, the damage had been done.

A hospital official admitted that at least some of the 30 children that died on August 10-11 had died due to shortage of oxygen but he refused to say exactly how many. ‘’Some children...mostly new-born have died in the hospital due to various reasons, including lack of oxygen,’’ he said.

Eyewitnesses said that there was chaos in the encephalitis and neonatal wards since the night of August 10 after the hospital ran out of oxygen supplies. The hospital administration made some alternative arrangements but the supply came to a complete halt around midnight.

BRD Medical College hospital, incidentally, is the only centre for treatment of encephalitis in the entire Gorakhpur division. It catered to patients from the districts of Basti, Kushinagar, Deoria, Siddharth Nagar, Maharajganj, the bordering districts of Bihar, and even from Nepal. According to officials, some 550 patients had been admitted to the hospital with encephalitis this year so far, of which 145 people, mostly children, had died. Over 60 patients were still being treated at the encephalitis ward, they added.

Social activists say that encephalitis, which made its first deadly appearance in Gorakhpur in 1977, had so far claimed thousands of lives, yet it was not on the agenda of any political party. ‘’While political leaders in their election speeches promise development of the region through round-the-clock power supply, good roads and industries, none of them even make a mention of the dreaded encephalitis, which has claimed the lives of thousands of children in the past few decades and still continues to take its toll’’, says Prof Dinesh Kumar, a former faculty member at Lucknow University.

“It is extremely unfortunate that encephalitis, which kills around 1,000 children every year in the region, has not been included in the poll manifesto of any political party,” said Dr R N Singh, chief convener, Encephalitis Eradication Campaign.

Singh and his colleagues had released a ‘people’s manifesto’, which had listed the wishes of the people of the region, and sent it to the leaders of all major political parties, urging them to take note of the same and act upon it.

While medical and drug researchers have remained helpless spectators of the annual scourge of encephalitis for the past four decades, due largely to the lack of resources to come up with a vaccine or treatments to combat the disease, the oxygen-related deaths were an entirely avoidable tragedy that occurred only due to the negligence and corruption of hospital authorities, and the negligent attitude of governments towards basic healthcare issues.


In the eye of the storm over the sudden death of 30 children on August 10-11, the suspended principal of BRD Medical College Dr Rajiv Kumar Mishra dismisses allegations of laxity on his part.

 

Q. It is alleged that you proceeded on leave at a time when oxygen stock was very low, without making any arrangements?

I was in Rishikesh when I came to know about the oxygen shortage. I spoke to the company supplying oxygen, but it refused to resume supplies.

I then spoke to other suppliers and cylinders were arranged. No deaths occurred due to shortage of oxygen.

 
There are allegations that you held up payments to the oxygen supplier.

The money was received on August 7. It was credited into the account of the company on August 11. There was no delay.

It is also charged that your wife, also a doctor, interferes with the working of the hospital.

There is no basis for such allegations.

 You say that you had resigned before being suspended. The government says otherwise. What’s the truth?

I had resigned a day before my suspension, taking moral responsibility for the death of
the children.