‘Deaths due to lack of manpower can’t be tolerated’: HC takes cognisance of Nanded hospital deaths

The Bombay High Court on Wednesday took cognisance on its own of deaths at two government hospitals in the Nanded and Chhatrapati Sambhaji Nagar districts of Maharashtra, The Hindu reported.

A division bench of Chief Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyay and Justice Arif Doctor stated that deaths due to a shortage of staff and medicines could not go on.

“If there are deaths due to lack of manpower and shortage of medicines, it cannot be tolerated at all,” the court said.

This came after an advocate named Mohit Khanna wrote a letter to the court urging it to take up the matter.

Khanna, in the letter, referred to the deaths of 31 patients, including 16 children, at the Shankarrao Chavan Government Hospital within three days in Nanded.

The court told Advocate General Birendra Saraf to gather data about vacancies in the hospital, the availability of medicines and the extent of government spending in the hospital.

The case will be heard further on Friday.

Hospital deaths

After reports of the deaths in Nanded came out, hospital dean Dr SR Wakode said that the recent transfer of staff led to a manpower shortage at the hospital and made managing a sudden surge in patients difficult.

He also said that the Haffkine Institute, responsible for procuring medicines for government hospitals across Maharashtra, had stopped the supply of drugs,...

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