A father lost his ailing son on his shoulder after he was allegedly turned down at the government-run Lala Lajpat Rai Hospital in Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh. Deteriorating health facilities at hospitals have been magnified by the death of a 12-year-old boy because he was denied timely access to medical facilities at different hospitals.
Sunil Kumar has alleged that his son Ansh died on his shoulder after he carried him from hospital to hospital on Friday.
“He was in Class 6 and very intelligent. I took him to a local hospital within 9 minutes, they asked me to take him to the government hospital,” Mr. Kumar says. His son had high fever since Sunday night.
The hospital’s emergency section refused to admit Sunil Kumar’s son. They suggested him to take Ansh to a children’s medical centre but did not provide any assistance to carry the boy.
“I begged doctors at the emergency to examine my son and admit him. They took 30 minutes before telling me to take the kid to the children’s hospital. I asked for a stretcher to carry my son, but the request was turned down,” Kumar said.
As no one came for help, Kumar bundled his son’s body on his shoulder and walked home.
Denying the allegations, the hospital authorities said, “We admitted him. We found that there was no heart rate, no pulse, and the pupils are fixated and dilated. We could tell from his condition that he died two to three hours before being brought in,” said Dr. RC Gupta, the chief medical officer of the hospital.
The incident highlights the pitiable condition of the health sector in this country. Last week, the video of a farmer in Odisha – Dana Majhi – had gone viral, where he was seen carrying his dead wife on his shoulder after he was denied an ambulance from the hospital authorities. Majhi’s wife had died of tuberculosis on Wednesday last in Bhawanipatna, and when he wasn’t provided an ambulance to take her to the burial site, some 30 kms away, Majhi carried her on his shoulders.
