‘Put mechanism in place to save lives of accident victims, pregnant women’
Afaq Bhat
Srinagar, July 14: Amid the spike in COVID-19 cases in Kashmir, patients, suffering from ailments other than this deadly infection, are facing a tough time.
According to the media reports the increase in number of the positive cases has shifted the focus of the administration towards creating more space for the fresh cases. In the process the patients who have other health problems are getting ignored. “The worst sufferers are the accident victims and the pregnant women. They are not provided any treatment till their COVID report arrives,” an analyst told Precious Kashmir.
He said, “We have seen many cases in the past where pregnant women and accident cases were left unattended. One can understand that the COVID reports of these patients are necessary but some kind of mechanism needs to be put in place to ensure that such patients don’t suffer for the want of treatment.”
An observer said, “The second wave of COVID-19 has proved deadlier than the first one. Besides there being a spike in number of cases, deaths are taking place daily. Not a single day is passing without deaths being reported.”
He said, “We can understand that doctors are under tremendous pressure and they don’t want to put their lives at stake by treating the patients whose COVID reports are not available. But the medicos should realize that emergency cases other than COVID-19 cannot wait for long. If such cases are made to wait they end up dying by the time their report comes. The administration needs to address this issue on war footing basis. It needs to ensure that waiting for the test report doesn’t become a reason for people to die.”
Another analyst said, “Since the outbreak of pandemic people with other aliments have stopped visiting the hospitals as they fear that they may catch COVID-19 but delay in their treatment could prove life threatening for them. The Coronavirus hasn’t spared anyone and with each passing day we are landing in a difficult situation. We cannot blame anyone for the prevailing mess as all of us are running short of ideas. We have no idea about how to handle the crisis and come out of this uncertainty.”
It’s in place to mention here that administration is making more beds available for the patients in the hospitals in Srinagar and other districts. There are reports that if the cases keep on increasing Kashmir may require more beds with ventilators as the chronic cases do need ventilator support.
A doctor said, “It’s a tight rope walk for our fraternity. We can understand that patients suffering from other aliments need our support but believe me our hands are tied. So many doctors have tested positive. Many medicos at present are either in quarantine or are admitted in the hospitals. Despite all odds we are trying our best.”
Waiting for COVID-19 report makes emergency cases suffer
