As people return to Kot Addu, its hospital feels the pressure

KOT ADDU: The wards at Kot Addu’s Tehsil Headquarters Hospital are full of crying children.

Three to four children are crowded on each bed as their mothers fan them desperately.

As the residents of Kot Addu return to the city, they are making their way to the overcrowded hospital, mainly to have their children treated.

The hospital was reopened after the flood passed through the city a few days ago.

About 140 to 150 people are being admitted daily.

Stagnant water in Kot Addu is infested with mosquitoes, and many adjoining areas are still cut off because the roads are flooded. The number of patients is likely to increase as the routes clear and more people return to the city.

Cholera

Among the hundreds of patients are also those suffering from cholera. Medicins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) tested 20 people admitted here, out of which six tested positive for cholera, which was also confirmed by the hospital’s pathologist.

The MSF has set up an isolation unit for cholera patients, with a capacity of 35 beds.

Contaminated water

Medical Superintendent Dr Ijaz Gormani says that the “seepage of flood water into the water lines,” is a cause of the spread of gastroenteritis. Stranded affectees drank flood water in the absence of clean drinking water.

According to the hospital administration, 80 per cent of the patients that are being admitted have gastroenteritis, 10 per cent have malaria, and another 10 per cent are suffering from skin ailments, diseases that are spreading swiftly in southern Punjab.

Shortages

The hospital is facing a shortage of medicines, such as antibiotics for children. Moreover, some of its medical staff has been deployed at relief camps. The hospital has asked donors and the government for more medicines and awaits the return of the staff from relief camps.

Given a shortage of beds, the hospital is only admitting patients “who are severely dehydrated,” one of the doctors, Dr Ghafoor, says.

Azra, who is a mother of four, has brought her three-year-old son Ahmed to the hospital. “He has been sick for two days. My youngest child is also sick, but I couldn’t bring her. The flood waters had encircled my house ... that’s how they fell ill.”

Husn Bano, who has worked as a nurse at this hospital for five years, says she has never seen anything like this. “Where do we put all these patients? We have no choice but to get them to share beds.”

In the women’s ward, 16-year-old Sanya Shafi’s relatives hover around her. She has been sick for days, vomiting incessantly.

A woman fans her 11-month-old granddaughter Noorul Ain. She has just returned to Kot Addu from Chowk Mandi where she and her family had fled to after their house flooded.

“There are four sick children in the house. The hospital doesn’t have any space,” she says.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 22^nd, 2010.