The increasing instances of senior doctors and medicos testing positive for coronavirus in government hospitals has angered the Telangana high court on Thursday.
In a span of three-days, as many as 23 Post Graduate medicos who were discharging their duties at various teaching hospitals affiliated to Osmania Medical College tested positive for Covid-19 and were shifted to Gandhi Hospital for isolation.
Apart from OMC medicos, four senior cardiologists from Nizams Institute of Medical Sciences (NIMS) and three Cath lab technicians too tested positive for coronavirus.
The high court wondered how so many doctors contracted Corona virus if they had been given the personal protection equipment (PPE) kits.
“We wonder whether they have really been given the kits. The government appears to be careless in this regard, despite the court orders and that is the reason why they got the infection,” the court said and directed that the government submit a comprehensive report by June 8.
The high court had earlier expressed serious concern over the conduct of lesser number of tests for Corona virus in Telangana. It also ordered the government conduct tests even for dead bodies.
Meanwhile, Director of Medical Education (DME), Dr. K Ramesh Reddy to issue instructions to Superintendents of all the tertiary hospitals to reduce infections among health care workers and at the same time continue to provide health care facilities to patients.
The DME has directed Superintendents to divide the faculty, PGs, paramedical and outsourcing staff involved in patient care equally into two batches.
One batch will go for quarantine of seven days while the second batch will be on duty. When the first batch joins duties after seven days, the second batch then goes for a quarantine of seven days.
If any staff member develops symptoms, they will be immediately isolated and tested. If found positive for Covid, they should be sent for treatment and a replacement should come from the quarantine pool of staff, the DME instructed.
Institution Head should make available adequate PPE and masks and assign one of the senior RMOs to monitor it closely. There should not be any scope for complaints of non-availability of PPE and masks, DME added.
