73 women sterilised in 4 hrs in Varanasi

Health officials in Uttar Pradesh have not learnt a lesson from the botched-up sterilisation surgeries in Chattishgarh that left several women dead.

On Thursday, 73 women were sterilised at a special camp in Varanasi, the Lok Sabha constituency of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in just four hours by a single doctor. The doctor took a little over three minutes for one operation. According to standard procedure, a doctor must not perform more than 30 such surgeries in a day.

The women were made to lie on the ground under the open sky amid biting cold. The agony of the women was compounded by the fact that the ground was wet owing to the rains that lashed the area the day before.

According to the reports, the surgeries were performed at Chiraigaon Primary Health Centre on Thursday. The matter came to light on Friday when pictures of the women lying on the floor appeared in local channels.

Sources said that 76 women had got themselves registered for surgeries at the special camp at the PHC, which has 30 beds.

The registration of three women was later cancelled after it was found that they were not well.

Though such special sterilisation camps were organised at the PHC almost every week yet there was no arrangement to provide post-operative care, sources said.

UP Chief Secretary Alok Ranjan has ordered a probe into the matter. “It is a very serious matter...we will probe it and stern action will be taken against the guilty officials,” Ranjan said.

Earlier, similar reports had been received from some other districts as well. Barely a few months back, doctors had performed 42 tubectomy in a single day and then made the women to lie on the floor.
DH News Service