The viral outbreak in western Uttar Pradesh’s Firozabad has thus far claimed the lives of 60 people. The chief medic of Firozabad district, Dr Dinesh Kumar, said as many as 60 people have died, out of which five died thanks to dengue, while a death audit is underway for the remainder .
As of September 15, as many as 458 patients were admitted to the govt hospital. The hospital has seen 207 new patients within the last 24 hours, of which 163 are infected with dengue Private hospitals are overburdened with patients, resulting in an unavailability of beds. This has prompted people to require their relations to Agra for treatment. India Today TV visited one among the most important private health care facilities in Firozabad, Unity Hospital. The hospital has no beds available to admit new patients and attendants.
60 PEOPLE DIE OF VIRAL FEVER IN FIROZABAD
We met Kishore, who is now carrying his younger brother to Agra as his platelet count has dropped drastically and he has been referred by Unity Hospital to Agra for treatment. Kishore said, “My brother was down with fever and his platelet count dropped, there’s nobody within the dormant hospital to concentrate and a personal hospital has referred him to Agra for treatment.”
We met Ram Kishor Verma outside the Unity Hospital, whose grandson is admitted to the overall ward and is undergoing treatment for fever. Ram Kishor said, “My grandson had a fever on Friday night and that we took him to local doctors. Since his platelet count dropped to 20000, we took him to a personal hospital.”
Another attendant, Pintu Singh, said his nephew was also infected and had to be delivered to a personal hospital after being denied a bed within the government medical college. Pintu Singh told India Today, “My nephew is 3 years old and his platelet count dropped and he was dengue positive, hence we had to bring him here. We did attend medical college but we were denied a bed.”
Several other locals narrated their pain and therefore the difficulty in arranging basic health facilities during this crisis. Locals also raised questions on the claims being made by the UP government and native administration, saying neither sanitisation is occurring in their villages nor the distribution of medicines or any health camps The administrator of the Unity Hospital, Vikas Jain, said his hospital is now fully occupied and there are not any vacant beds. this example has deteriorated within the previous couple of days and when there’s a severe case of a drop by platelet count, patients are mentioned Agra, he said.
We also visited the overall ward of Unity Hospital where things didn’t look good. All the beds were occupied by children affected by high fever or dengue Roli Gupta said his son had been ill for the last five days after the platelet count dropped, but now he’s recovering and thanked the doctors.
A doctor on duty within the ward, Dr Avinash, said things has turned vulnerable within the previous couple of days and most of them are patients of dengue. Dr Avinash said his two patients have died thus far thanks to the surge within the cases and almost 10 per cent of them are being mentioned since they do not have vacant beds. Dr Avinash said that out of all the cases, 80 per cent are of dengue. And now it’s becoming increasingly difficult to rearrange platelets, he said.
The private hospitals flooded with patients have now made makeshift arrangements. thanks to unavailability of beds, benches are became beds inside the ward to admit patients At Firozabad Medical College, which has been the epicenter of this crisis, we met the family of Taufik, who was admitted to the present government hospital thanks to viral fever. Taufik’s father told India Today that his son is now being mentioned Agra for treatment. We interviewed and met the officials within the hospital.
Authorities called his father inside the ward and later they said that his son wouldn’t be mentioned but would be treated there only. It brought a minimum of a flash of satisfaction when India Today told Taufik’s family that they might not got to take their son to Agra for treatment as he would be treated at Firozabad Medical College only.
Despite the crisis in Firozabad, principal of Medical College, Dr Sangeeta Aneja, says things deteriorated due to the panic that was spread. She said that this point there has been a panic which has increased our workload Dr Sangeeta said, “We have 540 beds and that we need to keep 50 to 70 vacant for an emergency, but most of the people come here to admit their patients even when there’s no serious case.” As per the Medical College principal, 13 patients died here during this hospital, of which eight died thanks to dengue.