The Meerut administration has launched a probe into the death of five patients in a private hospital after the kin alleged that the deaths occurred due to disruption of oxygen supply.
The relatives created ruckus in the hospital premises following which police had to appear on the scene.
Ujjwal Gupta said a nurse in the hospital had informed the family that their patient’s oxygen support system had run out of gas and that he was facing difficulty in breathing. “There was nobody to check if the oxygen was over or to refill it,” he told reporters, adding that there was no staff or doctor to explain to them how the patient died or how to take his body for final rites.
Chief Medical Officer Meerut Akhilesh Mohan said it is a matter of probe if the deaths took place due to lack of oxygen or other reasons. All the five patients who died on Sunday were co-morbid and seriously unwell, he said.
Mr. Mohan said some of the relatives had alleged that the oxygen supply at the Nutema Hospital had been disrupted for a while. The CMO acknowledged that in the present situation, the “supply of oxygen is tight,” and the administration and the government were trying to meet the requirements of all hospitals by providing “some amount” (thoda thoda) to all places.
The requirement had increased a lot and the local infrastructure was not ready for it, he told reporters, adding that they were trying to augment the infrastructure, he said.
Mr. Mohan also said an “artificial scarcity” was being created as people were carrying cylinders in their cars or storing them in homes. “The oxygen that should be in hospitals is inside people’s homes.”
The fresh allegations surface even after the Yogi Adityanath-led government had claimed there was no scarcity of oxygen in any hospital in U.P.
