The Hindu : National : Quacks make a quick buck in malaria-hit villages

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, May 07, 2006

National

National

Quacks make a quick buck in malaria-hit villages

Sushanta Talukdar

The socio-economic conditions are poor; there is a lack of awareness and poor sanitation

NO BEDS: Patients at the Laluk hospital in North Lakhimpur district of Assam on Saturday. Since the hospital was inaugurated not a single bed has been allotted. — PHOTO: RITU RAJ KONWAR

Jharigaon (Laluk): The residents of this forest-fringed village in Lakhimpur district call him `Pradip doctor.' Whenever a villager falls sick, family members rush to his `chamber' to request him to come to their house and examine the patient.

With his handbag full of vials of antibiotics and different kinds of medicines, Pradip Sonowal rushes to provide his own line of treatment, giving an antibiotic injection or sometimes an intravenous fluid to a needy patient.

With a malaria epidemic breaking out, quacks like Pradip Sonowal are having a field day. The Hindu met Mr. Sonowal while he was about to leave after administering an antibiotic injection to a malaria patient in this village. He admitted that he did not have an MBBS degree and had only received training in laboratory technology in Guwahati.

`Pradip doctor' charges Rs. 150 for each injection. He had administered ceftriaxone to Mina Subba and her two minor children Karma and Mamta, who were diagnosed with the malarial parasite at a medical camp organised by the health department, and advised them not to take chloroquine, the main anti-malaria drug for uncomplicated malaria. He then hurried to attend the next call from Pushpalata Gogoi.

"I know what I am doing is not legal. However, as villagers come to me I try to help them. I have some idea as to what medicines are to be used depending on the symptoms of the disease. I had learnt about such treatment while working as a ward boy in the private chamber of a local physician.

Moreover, I also have a retail medicine outlet," Mr. Pradip Sonowal said.

Poor access

The nearest hospital from the village is the 10-bed hospital at Laluk, which can be reached after crossing the Gabharu river. The socio-economic conditions in most of the villages under the Uttar Laluk Gaon Panchayat near the Assam-Arunachal Pradesh border are poor. Besides, there is a lack of awareness, poor sanitation and a congenial atmosphere for mosquito breeding.

Patients are carried to and fro to the hospital on bicycles for a period of three to four days as there are hardly any hospital beds left.

Most patients are made to lie on the floor for receiving intravenous fluids.

Since the epidemic broke out, this is a common scene at the hospital built from the MP's Local Area Development Fund located on National Highway 52. So far 122 cases of plasmodium falciparum, the most deadly form of the malaria parasite, and 188 cases of plasmodium vivax have been detected in the Laluk area while three persons affected by plasmodium falciparum have already died.

The health department, however, remains indifferent to illiterate villagers falling prey to pretenders like Mr. Sonowal, alleges a resident of Laluk.

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