Epidemic is fine but duty is 10 to 5

Health officials strictly follow their 10am to 5pm office timings — even if the situation is like an epidemic.

Doctors at Kasturba Hospital, the sole screening and treatment centre for influenza H1N1 in the city, stopped examining people at 5.30pm sharp on Thursday and asked them to return the next day.

Anxious people who had rushed to the hospital from every part of the city were told that screening would start at 10am the next day. Doctors collecting throat swabs of patients left at 5.30pm. More than 550 people visited the hospital over the past two days to get a swine flu test done.

Kirti Jha of Vikhroli reached the hospital at 6pm with her ailing son. But she was told that screening was over for the day and she should return the next day. “Our doctor told us that screening was going on round-the-clock. But the arrangement here is completely different,” she said.  

An IT executive left her office in Vikhroli in a hurry only to find that the centre at Kasturba had shut down for the day. “My general physician has refused to treat me because she is worried that I might have swine flu,” the 25-year-old executive said. Her house is in Grant Road and she has no history of travelling to any affected area. “We were under the impression that the centre would remain open 24X7. But we were simply told to go back,” she said. “We came here early in the morning. But they told us to return at 11am tomorrow.”

Dr Umesh Aigal, the medical superintendent of Kasturba, said the centre would work between 10am and 5pm. “We will remain open only in specific hours,” he said. Serious patients would be admitted to the swine flu ward without any delay. “We are asking the rest to return the next day,” he said. 

But people are confused as general practitioners don’t want to treat patients with flu symptoms. Sujata Kundan of Tardeo came to Kasturba with her two kids after her neighbourhood doctor refused to give medicines. “He said my children could be suffering from swine flu and it was best that I got them treated here,” she said. Though they did not have any history of travelling to affected areas, her children were not treated.

Dr A Mehta, a general physician from Santa Cruz, said, “If some one dies of swine flu when the doctor was treating him/her for seasonal flu, the doctor will be pulled up. To avoid any trouble, we are referring patients to public hospitals.”