A fire broke out early in the morning on Wednesday at the state-run Calcutta Medical College and Hospital and while 250 patients were shifted a 75-year-old died during the process.
The deceased has been identified as Saidul Islam Mullick. A resident of Khanakul in Hooghly district of West Bengal, Mullick had been admitted to the hospital for the last nine days. “There was smoke all over the place and patients were being brought out of the MCH building. There was no stretcher or helping hand available and he had to be walked out of the building. We took him to the Emergency Ward but in the afternoon he passed away,” said a family member of Mullick.
The fire broke out at about 8 am at the pharmacy and storeroom on the ground floor of the building. The floors above had departments such as hematology, endocrinology, gastroenterology, internal medicine, cardiology. As smoke was detected doctors ordered the immediate evacuation of patients. “When I saw the smoke, I immediately informed doctors and other staff members so that a quick evacuation could be done and no life was lost,” said Shankar Rao, one of the hospital workers.
As 250 patients needed to be evacuated as soon as possible and in the absence of enough workers of the hospital, relatives of patients got into the action and auto drivers from the adjacent areas also chipped in. Patients were walked out, carried on stretchers and even had to be carried out in bed sheets as not enough stretchers were available.
Ten fire tenders were pressed in which brought the fire under control in four hours. Officials of Disaster Management Group were also deployed. They used advanced gas cutters and broke holes on the walls to reach the source of the fire.
Officials of the pharmacy department said that medicines for about a month had been stocked. “Stock of medicines for about a month worth about Rs 5 crore had been destroyed. The temperature inside the pharmacy at 5.30 pm was 97-degree centigrade. Imagine what it had been when the fire was burning. The medicines have been rendered useless,” a senior official of the pharmacy department said. He said that it will be at least three days before the situation is back to normal because about 5,000 patients are treated at the outdoor department and 2,000 are admitted.
Director General (fire services) Jag Mohan reached the spot as well. “We have contained the fire. There will be a thorough investigation regarding its cause,” he said.West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had ordered two independent probe into the matter – one by the fire department and the other by the Public Works Department. They would submit the reports within a week.
State health minister Chandrima Bhattacharya said, “There had been a fire and to avoid any problem to other patients, they have been shifted.”
Congress Rajya Sabha member Pradeep Bhattacharya came down heavily on Mamata. “When there is a fire at a private hospital, Mamata stations herself there for hours. In this case, why isn’t proper firefighting infrastructure present? Why is the shifting of patients not done in a proper fashion? On a priority basis the shifting has to be done and a high level inquiry needs to be done,” he said.
State BJP president Dilip Ghosh said, “A bridge collapse, a bomb blast and a fire like this looks like different incidents but these happen when the government is busy trying to remain in power and destroy the Opposition. Administration is neglected.”
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