The Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation, acting on people’s complaints, has issued show cause notices to 10 private hospitals within its jurisdiction for flouting the directives related to COVID-19 treatment issued by the State government on May 21.
“The show cause notices were issued on Wednesday, giving them 72 hours to respond,” additional commissioner Sujata Dhole said.
While some of the complaints were about excessive billing, some said every patient was charged for a PPE kit during consultation while either the attending doctor would be without a PPE kit or wearing one that was used while attending to the previous patient.
“Some patients have complained that while the doctor continued to wear the same PPE kit, every patient had to bear the expenses of a new kit. The notices were issued after inspecting the complaints. Depending on the response by the hospital, action would be taken,” the NMMC PRO said.
The 17 directives issued to all private and charitable hospitals said that every COVID-19 hospital should get registered with the Mahatma Jyotiba Phule Jan Arogya Yogna, along with a rapid antigen facility on its premises. As much as 80% of beds will be regulated by the rates provided by the State, which should be displayed at the main entrance lobby.
The hospitals are supposed to update the real time bed occupancy data on the NMMC dashboard. The hospitals have also been asked to not take any deposit from the patient. No walk-in-patients with less than 95% oxygen saturation should be denied admission and if there is lack of availability of beds, the patient should be stabilised and shifted to an ambulance with an oxygen facility till the availability of the bed.
Violation of any of the directives will be considered an offence punishable under Section 188 of the Indian Penal Code.
