How did 37 doctors working in different government hospitals in the State contract coronavirus despite the government supplying them PPE kits and other safety gear?
Posing this question while hearing a batch of PIL pleas on COVID-19 situation and the way government was handling it, Telangana High Court asked the government to explain how the doctors were becoming vulnerable to the virus. A bench of Chief Justice Raghvendra Singh Chauhan and Justice B. Vijaysen Reddy asked Advocate General B.S. Prasad how so many doctors tested positive for the virus despite the government’s claims that it was providing all safety gear to the doctors attending on coronavirus patients.
The bench said that earlier the government had filed affidavits that PPE kits, N95 masks, gloves and goggles were being supplied to all the doctors and para-medical staff attending on and treating persons affected by COVID-19. Lawyer Chikkudu Prabhakar, representing one of the petitioners professor P.L. Vishweshwar Rao, told the bench that the government failed to provide safety gear to doctors and other staff exposing them to the risk of contracting the virus.
They were testing positive since the government was often tomtomming that they were doing everything to keep the doctors safe, failed in supplying with the required tools and gear to them. On one hand the government was depriving doctors of safety gear and on the other hand no serious efforts were being made to trace the primary contacts of persons testing positive for the virus, he contended. The AG requested the bench to adjourn the matter to present more detailed information on the matter.
The bench posted all the pleas to Monday for next hearing.
