Shallow brooks babble the loudest

Manav Mander

Advertisement

Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, February 13

Making tall claims seems to be the favourite pastime of the Punjab Government. It keeps saying it will eradicate drug addiction from the state, but when it is asked to provide psychiatrists at drug de-addiction centres, it goes mum.

The government recently opened some de-addiction centres and promised many more in the district, but in the absence of adequate psychiatrists, these will not do any good.

The drug de-addiction centre run by the state government at the Civil Hospital has been without a permanent psychiatrist for the past two months.

Since the arrest of Dr Sudha Vasudev on December 19 by the Jagraon police under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act, the centre is dependent upon the Health Department. She was arrested from a private clinic at Mullanpur Dakha for illegally selling psychotropic drugs to addicts. She was single handedly looking after the de-addiction centre, Red Cross De-addiction Centre and OPD of the hospital.

The government has not even made any arrangement. Patients who need advice and care regularly are left at the mercy of a doctor who visits the centre twice a week. Dr Raina Garg from Jagraon visits the centre on Tuesdays and Fridays.

The department had asked Dr Sushil Jain from Raikot to visit the hospital for the remaining four working days as well, but he did not do it.

Long queues of patients can be seen at the drug de-addiction centre of Civil Hospital. Patients have to return disappointed in the absence of any doctor.

Narrating his ordeal, a patient said they kept making rounds of the hospital. “My elder son is not well. There is a long queue at the OPD. I don’t know when my turn will come,” he said.

A woman standing next to the patient said, “Every five days, I come to the centre to get medicines for my ailing husband. Chemists do not give medicines without a prescription. We have to wait for hours to get the medicines. We are made to wait five to six hours.”

Another patient Kuljinder Singh, who had come with his younger brother, said: “After we came here, we realised that the picture is not rosy at the hospital. We arrived at the centre at 9 am and were not able to see the doctor till 1 pm. We cannot afford treatment at a private hospital,” he said.

He said only one doctor visits the hospital twice a week. “We have to wait for Tuesdays and Fridays to get through to the doctor,” he said.

Another patient said promises made by the state government to eradicate drug addiction from the state are “hollow”. “If the government wants to root out the menace, why is it not appointing doctors at the centres. It is a publicity gimmick. The reality is that the common man is suffering. There are no doctors at the centre. I fail to understand what’s stopping the authorities from making fresh recruitments,” he lamented.