Covid facilities in Karnataka didn’t have monthly fire audits

Though the incident at the Shimoga Institute of Medical Sciences on Sunday did not result in a fire accident, it was a close shave

A day after a major fire killed Covid patients in Maharashtra’s Ahmednagar hospital, the sealing air conditioner in Shivamogga’s McGann Teaching District Hospital exploded.

Though the incident at the Shimoga Institute of Medical Sciences (SIMS) on Sunday did not result in a fire accident, it was a close shave as hospital authorities noticed the Freon gas in the AC escape.

Hospital director O S Siddappa said they requested the state to release Rs 8 crore to install a hose to be used in the event of a fire accident, since the hospital cannot afford it.

“Fire sprinklers, thermostats and smoke detectors are features of an IT company, but no government hospital in the state has them,” a SIMS hospital administrator said.

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“While they asked us to install fire extinguishers, which we have, we don’t have funds to install a fire hose or automatic fire alarm system, which isn’t there in other hospitals as well.”

The state government had indeed complied with the December 2020 Supreme Court order to set up a committee in each district to conduct fire audits on Covid facilities at least once a month, but the committees did not seem to have audited the facilities every month.

The state has 33 dedicated Covid facilities.

The district committee in Shivamogga is made of a district health officer, district surveillance officer and hospital medical superintendent designated as a nodal officer for fire safety.

Dr Deepak S, special officer for the state-run Trauma and Emergency Care Centre (TECC) at the Victoria Hospital campus that treated maximum Covid patients during the first and second waves, confirmed it did not have even a single external fire audit by the district committee.

“We have had internal audits by our engineers, but no one from the district committee this medical education department circular talks about,” he said.

BBMP inspection

The Bengaluru Urban district committee audited nearly 40 hospitals at least twice over the last one year, district surveillance officer (DSO) N Manohar said. “All government general hospitals come under the BBMP’s wards. The inspection must therefore be done by the BBMP. We have inspected only Anekal hospitals.”

Confusion, however, prevails over jurisdictional responsibilities of Bengaluru District Health Officer (DHO) Dr Srinivas G A and BBMP Chief Health Officer Dr B K Vijendra.

Although the December 24, 2020 Medical Education Department circular says both government and private medical facilities must have a fire audit, Dr Srinivas said he was given responsibilities only for private hospitals. “The BBMP should form committees for government hospitals,” he said.

Also Read | Fire-hit Maharashtra hospital lacked safety measures suggested by local civic body: Official

Dr Vijendra said implementing the Karnataka Private Medical Establishment (KPME) Act rests with the Bengaluru Urban DHO. “We have been asking them to give us that responsibility, but they haven’t given it,” Dr Vijendra said.

The BBMP oversees only 140 primary health centres with just three rooms. “What fire safety can we check there?” asked Dr Vijendra, adding that the general hospitals come under the Health and Medical Education Department.

Principal Secretary for Health and Medical Education T K Anil Kumar did not respond to DH’s calls.

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