Medical system in small cities and villages in UP 'Ram Bharose': Allahabad HC

The Allahabad High Court on Monday remarked that the entire medical system of Uttar Pradesh in smaller cities and villages were 'Ram Bharose' or at the mercy of God, while also finding "insufficient" the number of hospitals, beds, staff, critical care equipment in the five districts it had asked details for in the last hearing to gauge the state's preparedness to treat patients in predominantly rural districts.
The HC was hearing a PIL regarding a range of issues being faced in the state amid the pandemic. It made the "Ram Bharose" comment in the light of the report of a Covid patient having gone missing in a district hospital in Meerut. After hearing the facts of the enquiry done in the matter, the court said it was a case of "high degree carelessness" on the part of doctors on night duty.

"If this is the state of affairs of treatment at medical College in the city like Meerut then the entire medical system of the State pertaining to the smaller cities and villages can only be taken to be like a famous Hindi saying ‘Ram Bharose’," said the court.

The court had also in its last hearing asked for details of the medical infrastructure with respect to both the rural and urban population in five districts, including Bijnor, Jaunpur, Bahraich, Shravasti and Barabanki. However, it, said, after perusing the report submitted by the district magistrates, it had "no hesitation" to observe that the health infrastructure was absolutely insufficient in city areas to meet the requirement of city population and in the rural areas the community health centres (CHCs) were virtually lacking in life saving gadgets. In most districts, level-3 hospital facilities which consist of ICU and ventilator beds, were not present.

It also asked the state to improve and increase the testing methods of the rural population and that of small cities and towns, as it said cited example of Bijnor where only 1200 people were tested in a population of 32 lakh, that too in a 60:40 ratio of RT-PCR to antigen tests, then the situation was "not happy".