JOIN USWard boy gave injection to infants, says father
The father of a baby girl, who died following suspected drug reaction at a hospital in Yelahanka Old Town on Monday evening, has claimed that a ward boy had given a dose of BCG to the infant, shortly after which she turned blue and died.
Narendra R, a granite businessman from Sadahalli on Kempegowda International Airport Road, had admitted his wife Chaitra, 20, to Shushrusha Nursing Home on May 23. She gave birth to the baby girl at 7.40 pm the next day.
On Monday, around 3 pm, doctors checked on the mother and the infant, and said they could be discharged as their condition was stable, according to Narendra.
“As I was completing the (discharge) formalities, a doctor said the baby should be given a dose of BCG. A ward boy named Ravi gave the injection to my baby and another baby. Within half an hour, the babies’ faces turned blue. Minutes later, their bodies turned blue and cold. We informed the doctor who rushed the babies to the ICU.
Panic around
Nurses and everyone in the hospital started running around. Later, they told us the baby died,” Narendra told Deccan Herald at the mortuary of Ambedkar Medical College and Hospital where he had come to get the infant’s body after post-mortem.
“How can they allow a ward boy to administer the dose? Doctors should be careful while treating infants. My wife got regular checkups at this very hospital but we don’t trust it any more,” he said, with tears in his eyes.
According to Narendra, his entire family was shattered by the incident. “Everyone was celebrating that a new member had arrived in our family. It was my first child. But just an injection turned everything upside down,” he said.
But Dhan Kumar, who works as a delivery boy at Jyothi Gas Agency in Yelahanka and whose baby boy too died in the incident, said he didn’t want to proceed with the case.
“We are not financially strong and do not have the wherewithal to take action against the hospital. We will just think our baby died of illness and keep quiet. Moreover, one of our relatives works at the hospital and we do not want him to be troubled by the hospital authorities.”
Sample to be sent to lab
Meanwhile, police have asked the hospital authorities to provide information about the company which supplied the medicine.
A senior police officer said a sample of the injection would be sent the Forensic Science Laboratory for examination. “Once we get the reports, we will take further action,” he added.