Bengaluru: Was she brought to hospital or not? A war of words has been going on between family members of a speech and hearing impaired girl who allegedly died due to non-availability of an ambulance last month, and health department officials.
The carrying of the dead body of twenty-year-old Rathnamma on a moped for want of an ambulance had hit the headlines and had triggered criticism from citizens on the functioning of the health department.
The girl had died when she was being taken for treatment on a two-wheeler from Kudugenahalli village to the nearest government hospital in Madhugiri in Tumakuru district.
Unfortunately, instead of addressing basic issues such as posting of a permanent doctor at the hospital and deploying the ambulance, the officials are now playing safe contending that she was never brought to the hospital.
“A contractual doctor and an Ayush doctor were present at the hospital but Rathnamma's family members never took her for treatment. Besides, they never called the 108 ambulance which would have definitely come to the village to shift her to the taluk hospital. Cross-checking of call records of the ambulance service did not have details whether the family had sought an ambulance. Instead, they went to a quack who might have given the wrong medicine resulting in further deterioration in her health condition,” claimed health department sources."We have shut the clinics of all quacks in Kudugenenahalli and surrounding villages".
The sources claimed that the hospital maintained a register containing names and addresses of visiting patients. But Rathnamma's name was not found in it. “In fact, an ambulance was available in a neighbouring village and that could have been arranged to shift her to the taluk hospital. This issue had taken a political turn to embarass the government. The family members have been tutored to give statements against the government."
A day after the incident, the district health officer was sent to the village and he too has given a report claiming that the deceased was not brought to the hospital at all and no call was made for an ambulance.
But discounting this theory, villages claim that no doctor stays back in the hospital after 3:30 pm. Apart from this, there were instances where many people had died due to delay or non-availability of an ambulance. Suppose, if doctors were available in the hospital, why would Rathnamma's family take her to a private practitioner, they wondered.
Meanwhile, Madhugiri Congress MLA K.N. Rajanna said it was Health and Family Welfare Minister KR Ramesh Kumar who was supposed to address problems of Kudugenahalli government hospital.
The minister had been requested several times and had been sent letters for providing an ambulance to the hobli headquarters but nothing had been done till date.
“Doctors posted to government hospitals never stay in their workplace. They come at 11 am and leave around 3:30 pm. This is not the story of Kudugenahalli hospital alone but of other hospitals across the state. "I will again meet Ramesh Kumar and request him to visit the village to know the truth," the MLA added.
