Over the past two weeks, as many as 26 infants have died due to lack of medical facilities for pre-mature babies at the DHQ hospital nursery, which is located a good kilometre away from the main building with only two ambulances available to transport the patients.
Ali, a conductor by profession, moved his newborn baby from a private clinic to DHQ hospital Sargodha on Monday morning, hoping to find some medical facilities in the hospital. To keep his son alive, Ali had to continuously pump air into him, using an Endotracial tube.
“How many more newborns must die before the government takes any affirmative action to improve medical facilities?” asked Ali.
Surprisingly, the Punjab government had already taken notice of the deaths on November 20 and formed several committees to probe into the matter. Several high-ranking government officials also visited Sargodha District Hospital, preparing a plethora of reports, but the situation on ground was no different than before as two more babies were nearing death due to absence of ventilator.
Doctors at the hospital revealed that despite all the actions by the government officials, their list of demands presented to the government were never met. “The hospital, despite being the only nursery in town for taking care of critical cases, has no ventilator,” they mentioned.
One of the hospital staffer, narrating his account of events that unfolded on November 18 and 19 said, “A nursery with capacity of only 25 new born received 51 new born babies on November 18. By November 19 some 8 newborns had expired while four expired on November 20, bringing the death toll to 12 in two days.” He said there were three duty doctors with only one nurse to look after the entire platoon of critical-conditioned-newborns.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 2nd, 2014.
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