BJP medical front visits Bhandara hospital, raises questions about fire safety

Nagpur: A team of doctors belonging to medical front (Vaidyakiya Aghadi) of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) visited Bhandara district hospital recently and consoled the parents who lost their newborns in the fire last week.
The team also interacted with the hospital authorities led by Dr Sanjay Jaiswal, deputy director of health services, Nagpur division.The team had a detailed discussion with Nana Patole, speaker of assembly.
The team comprised Dr Vinky Rughwani, MMC vice-president and Vidarbha coordinator, Dr Anup Marar, East Vidarbha convener, Dr Sachin Bagadiya, Marathwada convener, Dr Unmesh Shingne and Dr Anil Kanoje, East Vidarbha co-conveners of Vaidyakiya Aghadi.
This team visited the hospital on January 12 as per directives of Dr Ajeet Gopchade, state head of the medical front, “to provide expert and honest opinion on the tragedy”. Youth leader Atul Londhe and Dr Amol Bagadiya provided assistance to the team.
The team also raised some pertinent questions with the authorities.
Dr Rughwani stated that it is a fact that nobody expects or anticipates such a disaster to happen in their establishment. “That is why it is termed as an accident. But we want the authorities to genuinely try to look for the serious lapses that led to the system collapse,” he said.
Elaborating on the matter, Dr Marar mentioned that a staff is always expected to be present in a NICU. “A spark or burning smell itself can catch the attention. Yet, why nobody noticed the fire until the whole ward went up in flames and the glass partition broke with a blast? Moreover, who delayed the sanction of fire safety measure proposal submitted by Bhandara hospital authorities?” he said.
Dr Shingne asked why all government establishments are not mandatorily made to ensure that their buildings are fire safe. He demanded that fire audits should be conducted on periodic basis, as expected in case of private health care sector.
Dr Kanoje said all concur that such incidents be termed as tragic accident but why criminal action is immediately undertaken against concerned hospital owners if such accidents happen in private health care sector?.
Dr Bagadiya said that regular fire and electrical safety audits and recruiting full-time biomedical engineers in addition to having regular periodic servicing of all electronic and mechanical paraphernalia is essential not only in all government and private health care sector but also in all public utility concerns.