Life will not be saved by paper data: High Court warned – If there is no ventilator then what is the use of records?

Lucknow, Read: The Lucknow bench of the High Court, during the hearing on a PIL, has raised serious questions regarding the availability of ventilators in hospitals. The court has said that if ventilators are not available to the patients when they require them, then the figures presented regarding the number of ventilators have no validity. With these observations, the Court has asked the State Government as to what portion of the total budget has been allocated for medical facilities and what is the condition of the facilities in the hospitals. The next hearing of the case will be on May 25.

This order has been given by the division bench of Justice Rajan Roy and Justice Manjeev Shukla on the petition filed by We the People organization. The Court said that the question is whether any hospital is in a position to state on an affidavit that whenever a patient requires a ventilator, the hospital will provide him a ventilator within a reasonable time and if it is not so, then the figures given in the affidavit have no meaning, the effort should be to provide adequate number of ventilators, so that no one dies due to non-availability of ventilators.

The court made a scathing comment and said that the data presented is not satisfactory on this aspect, in fact it appears that there is no system in the state to determine what is the demand for ventilators in the hospital and how many ventilators should be available to save lives, unless this system is developed, giving such data would be meaningless. The court said that the state government should reconsider this entire issue and not be satisfied only with the minimum standards set by the National Medical Commission such as the availability of ventilators for 10 to 15 percent of the total beds in hospitals.

The court has ordered to issue a notice by making the National Medical Commission and the Central Government also parties. The court also sought information about the regulation of private hospitals and clinics and the monitoring system of their fees and services. The court said that the government should also clarify whether there is any regulatory regime under any law, rule or any other provision to control the operation of private hospitals and clinics, especially with regard to the fees charged for the treatment of patients.

The Court also remarked that super specialty hospitals should not be limited to Lucknow only, but should be developed in other districts also. The court also expressed concern over the tendency of government doctors to go to the private sector due to their low salaries. Said that the question of adequacy of salary being given to government doctors is also worth considering, especially in comparison to the salary being given to doctors working in private hospitals. This aspect is also important because due to low salaries in government hospitals, many doctors migrate to private hospitals, due to which common citizens are deprived of their experience and services.