MONDAY, MAY 06, 2024
Team Herald
PANJIM: There is a palpable sense of panic, grief and anxiety in and around Goa Medical College and Hospital (GMC), Bambolim as 300-plus COVID patients are fighting for their lives.
Winthin 24 hours of Chief Minister Pramod Sawant assuring of no shortage of oxygen anymore, Wednesday morning, there were multiple cries for help and SOSs to the Chief Minister’s Office as some wards ran out of oxygen.
A day after the Health Minister Vishwajit Rane admitted that there were over 20 deaths in GMC in the night due to lack of oxygen, there were more claims of deaths at GMC because of adequate supply of oxygen.
Family members around paitients pointed out that each of the wards has a capacity of 28 beds and there are 50-odd patients nudging for space. “The ratio of doctors and nurses for each ward is simply not enough. There have been times when a patient is sinking and the doctor and nurses rush to revive this patient. At the same time another patient turns critical and these staff has to be divided to provide attention to both. The medical staff is doing their best but they are simply outnumbered,” said one of them. At times there are one doctor and four nurses attending 50 patients in a ward, they claimed.
Some patients are on the floor, some on stretchers, and some on wheelchairs. Families understand it is difficult for the medical staff to pay equal attention to all of them. It apparently becomes more crucial at night with unavailability of resources and the administration takes time to respond.
There are many of the ilk. Post Tuesday midnight, a minister’s relative needed oxygen and as there was a crunch of oxygen. Attempts were made to take a cylinder from another patient but the latter’s attendee did not allow that to happen.
Another family said they are managing with privately arranged oxygen cylinder and regretted government’s prohibition on refilling cylinders at Scoop Industries. “We are not allowed and the officials say GMC has enough oxygen. But that is not the reality,” said the patient party.
COVID volunteers sugegsts councilling of the patients. One cited, a patient at GMC had his wife admitted to another hospital. His wife passed away and as he was unable to be with his family so a volunteer played out the funeral online for this man. They are communicating with the families of the patients even abroad.
“With the number of deaths taking place, it has not been easy for families to get the bodies of the deceased too. Some of them actually are finding it tough to afford it, be it the cost of transportation of the body or cremation costs,” added a volunteer.
