An expert team of doctors from All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Delhi, descended on Goa twice in seven days. It examined Covid-infected Union Minister for Ayush, Shripad Naik, who is undergoing treatment at a private hospital. A battery of specialist doctors attended on Shripad -- Dr Rajeshwari, Head of Critical Care Medicine at AIIMS, Dr Anand Mohan, Head of Department of Pulmonary Medicine, Lt Col Munish Kumar, Transplant Anesthesiologist and another Critical Care Specialist from Army Hospital Delhi, Lt Col M Shyam. The visiting doctors endorsed the line of treatment at the private hospital and ruled against flying Shripad to Delhi for further treatment.
Shripad has been under treatment for the last twelve days, and AIIMS teams are being flown in periodically to check on his parameters. Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP President J P Nadda are also being apprised of his health status. That’s for the VVIP status of a Union Minister.
Cut to the common man where life continues to be a daily struggle of uncertainties. Where precious lives are lost, and nobody cares, where co-morbidity is blamed for literally every single death that is happening while the famed healthcare watches helplessly. So much so, that the administration is beginning to lose track and refraining from announcing co-morbidities of individual patients. Lest we forget, In-charge of Covid Hospital Margao, Dr Uday Kakodkar, made a sweeping and insensitive statement recently that critically ill patients would have died whether there was Covid or not.
Interestingly, on the sidelines of this visit by the AIIMS specialists, they are believed to have reviewed the COVID-19 treatment facilities at Goa Medical College and Hospital, Bambolim, and the Covid hospital at Margao. Health Minister Vishwajit Rane promptly tweeted that the team expressed satisfaction over the treatment given to Covid patients and said that the experts shared valuable inputs.
The question is if everything is ok, why are ordinary citizens falling like ninepins? On the day when the team of experts from AIIMS arrived, Goa suffered another mighty blow from Covid, and nine lives were lost, raising the death toll to 157. A day earlier, among the dead were a 53-year-old patient from Dharbandora, a 49-year-old from Mangor Hill and a 52-year-old from Pernem. Is every death due to comorbidity?
The AIIMS team cannot make an assessment based on the line of treatment given to VIPs and a few hand-picked patients. There is a sea of a difference between the healthcare that is on display, and what is being offered. The team’s visit is a well-orchestrated move to cover up shortcomings. If this was a serious exercise, the health minister must give a detailed account of what the team was apprised about, and the suggestions received. Also, there needs to be an explanation of why a review by the AIIMS team was not done when it visited Goa earlier. Don’t try to project ‘all is well’ when the common man is suffering in silence. The people of Goa cannot be taken for a ride with such devious stunts.
