It is the alerts about a possible cyclonic storm in the Bay of Bengal that has calmed the heat prevailing over sum hospital fire tragedy since a week. But the incident will certainly haunt the collective conscience of the state as a grim reminder about the failing health situation in the state, which made the health minister of the state tender his resignation two days back. But the buck does not stop here, for, the tragedy has exposed the can of worms the government department officials had been feeding in for over years, questioning their need in the system.
In the last 16 years of BJD government nothing has changed in the health care system in Odisha. A trip down memory lane pre 2000 era suggests the state had the same set of problems as now and the archives are a testimony to it all. There were less hospitals, doctors, infrastructure, medicines, medical students and colleges, vaccines etc. And the things that were more were malnutirion cases, deaths due to inability to access doctors and hospitals. Nothing much has changed now. What has changed in the Naveen Patnaik ruled state for three and half terms are a host of health care schemes like the 108/102 ambulance service, Niramaya scheme that provides free medicines, Swasthya Bima Yojana , Mamata Yojana, the Mahaprayan scheme etc which the CM dedicated to the state at intervals. The implementation of these schemes have however eluded the majority of population in the state. Because the health departments including the minister and the secretaries responsible for implementing the schemes and monitoring the same through their down-in-line officials have not done their work. Which is why free medicines are not available in the Niramaya stores in government hospitals, ambulance failures have brought out Dana Majhis and failure of Janani express makes us wake up to cases of pregnant women dying before delivery or on way to the hospital. At present, the state is grappling with Japanese encephalitis where more than 69 have succumbed in 46 days and in recent past Nagada (Jajpur) malnutrition had taken a toll of 19 children. Schemes and statements remain rhetorics.
Coming to the infrastructure, in early 2000, when the state was looking up in driving the health sector index, private hospitals mushroomed and so did the diagnostic labs. Even some of these hospitals went on to become medical colleges of repute. A case in point is IMS and SUM hospital (2005-06) which has 650 MBBS seats, 150 PG seats, 1000 nursing seats and as many dental seats in the state besides running a 700-bedded 24-hour hospital. It was during this phase that permissions were granted dime a dozen to all those who wished to have their medical education or treatment institutions. Naturally, the upbeat scenario gave them all clearances by the same government to go ahead and never bothered for 10 years about patients’ safety and security till a tragedy like SUM happened. A hospital that was most frequented by the less privileged ones and offered services of the best medics in the industry free of cost for years, and later on on subsidized prices, Sum suddenly fell from grace. Besides the government cancelling all its empanelments and schemes applicable there, the Khurda district collector has gone on record to say the hospital did not possess an NoC to run its operations. An addition, the Bhubaneswar Development Authority (BDA) that perpetually remains in slumber, stated that the hospital was running without an occupancy certificate.
Now, why were there no objections raised to these issues if norms were flouted at all levels in the last 10 years? How could a government allow a hospital to run and treat over 1000 OPD patients every day without an occupancy certificate? Why did the district collector not cancel the licence of the hospital if the registration was not renewed and NOC not received? And most importantly, how did the hospital get the clearance from MCI if it did not have any of the important documents in place? The case dittoes for all the 1700 private hospitals and nursing homes in the state who have unanimously stated their applications for renewal of registration and fire safety are pending clearance from the government despite reminders. On November 1, these hospitals will cease work in protest.
Last but not the least, the NHRC seeking its report from the state government has stated that only three private hospitals in the state have all the fire safety measures in place. Now if the government was well aware of repercussions and came up with the Fire safety Act years back, the onus of implementation naturally lied with the Fire department. An Act formulated 23 years ago, has no rules been framed till now. But a department that functions under direct supervision of the chief minister Naveen Patnaik remained indolent about monitoring or raiding hospitals to check whether safety measures are in place. Not a surprise then, the lacunae if any, was not found out till the accident happened. Ironically, the fire department has issued an NoC to BDA about SUM’s fitness to operate. Applications, around thousands, pile up in the fire department to get lost.
Let’s accept, the government machinery in the state has turned carcinogenic. Starting from bureaucrats who run the show in Odisha to the departments like fire and BDA, do not bother till disasters strike and then fail to own up their failure. It is not only the health minister who accepted the failure of his department, its time for the bureaucracy to be cleaned of its senility and take responsibility. In a face saving measure, the government officials’ blame game will make more skeletons tumble from the cupboard pointing at their inefficiency and callousness!
Pic: patch.com
Pic: patch.com
