Wait for ambulance, hospital and crematorium a common sight in Gujarat

Ahmedabad resident Ameesh Patel's 69-year-old mother Bharati Mahesh Patel was undergoing treatment at a private hospital where she got infected with coronavirus about 10 days ago. The private hospital discharged her immediately asking her to get admitted to a Covid-19-designated hospital.

Ameesh's efforts to secure a bed in the hospital didn't yield a positive result. With the help of his friends, he was able to secure a few medicines like Remdesivir and started home treatment. On April 19, his mother's oxygen level saturated dangerously and he dialled emergency ambulance service 108.

"The wait hour was over 24 hours. The ambulance reached the next day on April 20 at 12 pm. It got stuck outside the civil hospital as there were several ambulances already in the line waiting to admit the patients they were carrying. Nearly three hours passed while waiting and my mother's condition kept deteriorating. Someone realised this and broke the line to take her inside the hospital. It was too late. She had died in the van itself," Patel told DH.

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His ordeal didn't stop as he had to wait for over six hours to get his mother's body. He said that by 9.30 pm, a hearse carrying another dead body along with his mother took him to a crematorium at Thaltej.

"Even in the crematorium, there was a waiting list and our turn would have come after 13 to 14 hours. We went to another one in Vasna where after waiting for three to four hours, we could cremate her," Patel said, adding, "I just don't know how to react to the events that unfolded. I couldn't get a hospital bed for my mother. It was my fate perhaps, can't complain to anyone, even the government".

Patel's ordeal has become common in most of the parts of Gujarat as the number of active cases nears a lakh in the state. With rising daily counts, reports of patients lining up outside hospitals for getting admitted, long queues at crematoriums for last rites, a massive shortage of oxygen and medicines like Remdesivir have become a "routine struggle".

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Patients are forced to wait for hours for the 108 services to take them to Covid-19-designated hospitals as they are not getting admitted on their own. This has resulted in chaos, with relatives making frantic calls for securing a bed, tagging social media influencers for procuring drugs and oxygen after failing in their attempts to get help from the government channels. Based on such incidents, the high court has sought answers from the government as to why patients are picked up "only through ambulance 108."

The Vijay Rupani-led BJP government is being criticised for not taking quick decisions early when it had time. The state also didn't follow the advice of the Centre team which had asked it in March to increase RT-PCR testing.

Gasping for oxygen

The pandemic has hit the state hard with active cases reaching over 92,000 by Thursday evening. The state has been seeing record high number of cases. On Thursday, it reported 13,105 new cases and 137 deaths, the highest since the onset of the pandemic. On April 18th, the government had claimed that it wanted to make 1 lakh beds available by the end of the month.

On April 18, the state government told the high court that "Total oxygen production in the state is quantified at 1,100 metric tons. 70% of the total production is reserved for hospitals and healthcare use as notified in government resolution dated 12th April. Whilst considering the ground situation and the emergent demand for oxygen in the four districts of Ahmedabad, Rajkot, Surat and Vadodara, vide notification dated 13th April 2021, the entire production of oxygen, in these four districts, estimated at 482 metric tons is being employed for hospitals and healthcare sector."

Officials said, this is still not enough.

On Wednesday, an office bearer of Ahmedabad Hospitals and Nursing Home Association resigned reportedly after his repeated request for more oxygen to Covid-19 private hospitals was not heeded by the government. On the same day, at least two persons were reported dead due to lack of oxygen in Banaskantha district in north Gujarat.

Popat Mali, a resident of Palanpur, told reporters, "My nephew and two cousins are Covid-19 positive and critical for the past six days. The hospital doctors are asking us to arrange oxygen as they don't have it." When contacted, collector Anand Patel denied that there was any death due to oxygen scarcity.

Principal Secretary, Health, Jayanti Ravi and Food and Drugs Control Administration Commissioner Hemant Koshia didn't respond to calls for further information.