PUNE: Women PUNE: Women cradling babies, schoolchildren tagging along with parents, college-going teens, senior citizens and even pregnant women - more than a thousand people thronged Pune's government-run Naidu Hospital on Wednesday as panic deepened two days after the country's first fatality from swine flu was reported from the city.
Men, women and children with the slightest hint of cough and cold, anxious to get tested for the flu virus, began gathering from early morning and doctors and hospital staff soon found themselves swamped by a jostling crowd.
What made things worse was private general physicians, who normally are the first point of consultation, turning back patients who came to them with cold and fever symptoms, telling them to get checked at Naidu Hospital.
Pune municipal commissioner Mahesh Zagade said 20 patients suspected of having the virus were admitted to the hospital on Wednesday. Nine positive cases were reported as more people reported for testing, following the death of 14-year-old Rida Shaikh. The city planned 15 more screening centres for the H1N1 flu from Thursday. The civic administration also decided to increase the number of doctors at the hospital to clear the rush.
As the crowd at the hospital grew larger, tempers rose. Around 11am, a scuffle broke out between members in the crowd and the hospital staff following confusion regarding entry into the medical officer's cabin. However, policemen deputed at the hospital brought the situation under control.
No sooner than he came to the hospital for an inspection, municipal commissioner Zagade was surrounded by concerned parents. Parents of students from St Anne's School, where Rida Shaikh studied, demanded that their children be tested first.
``One doctor can handle 40-45 cases in a day. With more and more people pouring in here, we need more experts to deal with the situation,'' Zagade said.
On Wednesday, as many as 100 throat swab samples were sent for testing to the National Institute of Virology (NIV).
The institute usually receives an average of 40 samples every day. In view of the large number of samples, the NIV has doubled its workforce and machinery.
Taking note of complaints that private practitioners were directing patients to Naidu Hospital with minor ailments, district collector Chandrakant Dalvi warned that it would be considered a ``serious offence'' if any doctor avoided his duty of initially screening flu patients.
However, Dilip Sarda, president of the Pune unit of the Indian Medical Association, told TOI that the developments following Rida's death had created a panic in the medical fraternity. ``Doctors are reluctant to check patients suffering from cold and fever as they fear action may be taken against them if any of the patients test positive for H1N1 later. However, the IMA is appealing to the doctors not to refuse patients,'' he said.
With more than 70 confirmed cases of H1N1 flu coming from various city schools so far, the Pune Municipal Corporation
(PMC) held an emergency meeting of school representatives on Wednesday and instructed principals and headmasters of all private and municipal schools to raise awareness about the flu among students and their parents and submit a report about the steps taken to the civic body on August 7.
Meanwhile, worried parents at Naidu Hospital, many of whom waited for over two hours, seemed far from satisfied with the doctors.
``All the doctor did was counsel us. He refused to do the swab test even though my son has been suffering from fever, diahorrea and vomiting since the last six days. The doctor says unless they are sure that he has come in contact with an infected person, they will not do the test. But since my son goes to school, it is difficult to say whether he has come in contact with a positive case,'' said an angry father.
Another parent, also unhappy with the testing, said, ``In the past few days, we have been to the railway station, banks and other public places. How can we possibly know whether anybody there was infected or not?”
Defending their stand of not testing every person who showed symptoms, Narendra Thakur, medical officer at the Naidu hospital, said, ``The government has set criteria for us to conduct the tests. The swab test will be done only if a person has been abroad recently or has come in contact with a positive case. We have to work according to the guidelines of the government. Due to panic, even those suffering from ordinary flu are coming to us and we cannot test everyone.''
The Pimpri Chinchwad Municipal Corporation (PCMC) also held a meeting of school representatives on Wednesday. PCMC medical officer R R Iyer told TOI that the civic body has appointed 42 medical officers to keep a watch on schools in the municipal limits. The relatives of two H1N1-positive cases in the PCMC limits have been quarantined at home.
Aundh civil hospital, which is the other centre for treating and admitting H1N1 cases, took in 17 new suspected cases on Wednesday. The hospital has seen 18 positive cases so far. Of these, 15 have recovered.
In Satara district, the Krantisinh Nana Patil hospital opened a special screening cell on Wednesday. Twenty-five positive cases have been detected in the district over the past two weeks. The hospital presently has six confirmed and two suspected cases. Seventeen patients have recovered.
TOI
