City's major hospitals turn away two-day-old baby

For 22-year-old Viresh Dahiya, a para-medical staff working for the CATS ambulances, Thursday night was a nightmare as he tried to save a two-day-old baby with limited oxygen in the ambulance. Dahiya moved around the city for five hours with the newly-born baby and his parents in the wee hours as all major city hospitals refused to admit the baby.

"At 2 am on Friday, we received a call on our helpline from a family at St Stephens' Hospital. When we reached the hospital, we realised that it was an infant, who was breathless and with a heart issue, needed urgent oxygen support," said Dahiya. "The family told us that they had already been refused at three hospitals," Dahiya added.

Ashish Bharti and his wife Geeta Bharti had given birth to a healthy child two days ago. The child developed a few heart complications on Thursday afternoon and was rushed to GTB hospital from where he was taken to Chacha Nehru and then St Stephens Hospital. However, they were refused admission due to either unavailability of bed or equipment. All the major hospitals including Kalavati, GB Pant, and even AIIMS refused to even look at the condition of the baby.

"We waited outside every hospital and begged them to take a look at the child, but none of the doctors came out to see him in the ambulance," said Denis Bharti, a family member. "Had we not involved the media, even RML would not have admitted him this morning," he added.

The patient is currently in the Intensive Care Unit and the RML staff refused to comment.