Gujarat High Court asks govt to verify number of docs, general practitioners in state

The Gujarat high court on Friday asked the state government to share data about specialised doctors and general practitioners in the state. The question arose after allegations were made that there aren't enough doctors in the state to handle the rapidly spreading swine flu.

The first division bench of Chief Justice R Subhash Reddy and Justice Vipul Pancholi heard the public interest litigation moved by Manasvi Thapar. The petitioner's contention is that enough action and measures are not being taken by the state government due to which the death toll is rising.

The petitioner's advocate, KR Koshti, submitted that a total of 4,371 doctors posts are approved by the government against which 3,168 doctors are available right now, and 1,203 posts are vacant across the state. The numbers include doctors from primary health centres to mega city civil hospitals. About 55 per cent posts of specialised doctors are vacant. This could be one of the reasons leading to 358 deaths from swine flu. The advocate also alleged that out of 33 districts, 24 districts don't have a laboratory to carry out swine flu tests.

Submitting the state government's reply, the Additional Advocate General Prakash Jani submitted that the state is tackling the disease's spread at four levels. These include creating awareness about precautionary steps and making medicines and health facilities available to citizens free of cost. Jani also informed the court that the state is making Tamiflu medicine available free of cost at all government medical hospitals, and added that all tests of swine flu patients are conducted free of cost.

The matter will be further heard on September 6.

Swine flu claims four more lives, death toll now 358

Swine flu death toll in the state climbed to 358 on Friday as four more patients succumbed to H1N1 virus in the last 24 hours. The state government said in a release that 172 new swine flu cases were reported in the state in the last 24 hours. With this, the total number of swine flu cases in the current year touched 5,259, which is the highest in the country. The number of swine flu deaths on Friday was the lowest in a single day in almost a month during which the average daily deaths were 9 - 10. Out of 358 deaths in the state since January, close to 300 deaths were reported in August alone, according to officials, who also said the cases of swine flu are now bottoming out.