The strike by doctors and staff of the Health and Family Welfare Department has turned KC General Hospital here into an infection zone. With no water supply even in the operation theatres, the stench of blood and medical waste has become unbearable. Used blood-stained bandages, clothes and bed linen apart from medical instruments have been dumped all over the operation theatres.
“We have no water even to wash our hands. Even if the strike stops and the supply starts, it will take at least three days for the operation theatres to be cleaned and fumigated, and the instruments sterilised,” a staff nurse in-charge of the theatre told The Hindu on Monday.
Dialysis services were stopped for the third day (the dialysis unit functioned on the first day of the strike on February 8). The neonatal ward, that was the worst affected because of disruption in water supply, wore a deserted look on Monday. Only two newborns were in the ward with their mothers. The number of inpatients dwindled from 39 on Sunday to less than 25 on Monday.
Mohammed J. Amir (38), from Gauribidnur, was desperate to get a dialysis done. “My sessions are scheduled on Monday and Thursday. My legs are swollen and I cannot afford to miss dialysis,” he said.
Parvathi, another patient who came in for dialysis, was referred to the Institute of Nephro Urology. Apart from them, eight more dialysis patients were sent away on Monday.
Most wards wore a deserted look with the blood bank, laboratory and other diagnostic facilities also coming to a standstill.
The scene at the general hospitals in Yelhanka and Jayanagar was similar. Krishna, a resident of Agrahara Layout, managed to get admitted at the hospital with great difficulty on Monday. “I have been asked to leave the hospital today itself,” he said.
