Sirsa hospitals on alert after swine flu death

Sushil Manav

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Tribune News Service

Sirsa, November 1

A day after Sirsa reported its first swine flu fatality this season, the district health authorities have put all government hospitals on alert.

The health authorities have set up an isolation ward at the General Hospital, Sirsa, and organised a meeting of medical officers and senior medical officers yesterday and instructed them.

The move came after Kaushalya (50) of Rania town succumbed to the virus on her way to the Post Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences (PGIMS), Rohtak, at Fatehabad yesterday.

Kaushalya’s family alleged that they had to shuttle the victim twice between the ill-equipped General Hospital and a private hospital before she was referred to the PGIMS, Rohtak.

Sirsa Civil Surgeon Dr Suraj Bhan Kamboj told The Tribune the isolation ward was already in place on the upper floor of the trauma centre.

“We have 200 tablets of Tamiflu. We have also ordered more tablets and masks. Dr Tapasya Bishnoi, an ENT surgeon at the General Hospital, Sirsa, has been directed to collect samples of suspected patients,” Kamboj said.

Asked whether the authorities have isolation wards at any other hospitals (places), he said at present, the Health Department had the facility at Sirsa alone, but it could be provided at Dabwali and Ellenabad, if situation warranted.

The civil surgeon said the department had surveyed the area where the victim was living, but he was not sure whether any samples of the suspected patients had been collected from there.