At city hospitals, empty corridors and worried faces

Today, entering any of the several city hospitals, one was struck by two common scenes--– empty corridors and worried faces of doctors and nurses.

As The Business Standard talked with doctors at the Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University, they said they were ready to treat coronavirus infected patients.   

But when talking over the phone, their voices change. They say they are worried because they have no protective gear, something that the authorities should have procured long ago.

And most hospitals are redirecting patients coming with breathing problem and coughs to Kurmitola General Hospital which has a coronavirus treatment cell.

At the BIRDEM hospital, a nurse said she was actually terrified to take on patients because she had not been issued any protective gear, a must for treating Covid-19 patients that she claimed to have seen at the place.

Doctors at the hospital are not taking any chances. They are turning away any patients with symptoms.

"We are checking if the patients had been abroad just to be sure if they could be infected. But the patients are not revealing the truth. We have found out a patient whose husband has recently returned from Italy, but she did not reveal it," said a doctor.

But doctors also were secretive to reveal the actual readiness at their institutions. Many doctors disclosed they had been warned by the authorities not to speak with the media regarding their preparedness because it might "create panic."

Meanwhile, the normally crowded hospitals are now almost empty. Regular patients are avoiding them for fear of being infected.

At present, only 322 beds at Kuwait Bangladesh Friendship Government Hospital, Kurmitola General Hospital, Mugda General Hospital and Infectious Disease Hospital are being used to provide care to Coronavirus infected patients. Among them, the Kuwait Bangladesh Friendship is the only one dedicated for Covid-19 patients. 

Experts suggest ensuring non-mixing of general patients with COVID-19 patients to stop the spread of the virus to healthcare providers and general population.

Meanwhile, the government is going to set up the equipment necessary for diagnosing COVID-19 at eight other public healthcare facilities, including the BSMMU by next week, said the Institute of Epidemiology Disease, Control and Research (IEDCR) that is spearheading the fight with the pandemic.

There have been cases where hospitals refused to accept patients with respiratory problems because their symptoms look suspiciously similar to those with Covid-19 virus. 

In this regard, AKM Akhtaruzzaman, chairman of the anaesthesia and intensive care medicine department of the BSMMU, said the suspected patients were isolated and then samples were sent to the IEDCR for testing.

"If found positive, they were referred to any of the designated hospitals for COVID-19 patients," he said.

But the process takes at least two days and the wait can be fatal for the patient.  For an immediate and intermediate solution, the BSMMU authority has considered procuring rapid diagnostic test kits that cost $350 for each set of 10.

This is the backdrop to many critical patients with respiratory problems falling through the crack.

The father of a residential doctor at the BSMMU died a couple of days back because he had been kept waiting for the result of COVID-19 test before treatment. By the time, his daughter learnt on March 17 that her father was negative, he had died.

Earlier, a Canada returnee was refused treatment at Dhaka Medical College Hospital, according to The Daily Star, because she had cough and fever. She died but her test result, returned much later, was also negative.

Vising a few public hospitals today, the correspondents of The Business Standard found very few patients.

Nurses and other staff complained that they did not even get gloves. Since several suspected patients have been referred from their hospitals, they were scared of contacting the infection.

At Kurmitola General Hospital having a Corona Cell, a doctor said, nurses and support staff were reluctant to show up in operating theatres for fear of infection.

Several hospitals reported they were not performing any surgeries unless it was urgent.

BIRDEM General Hospital did have a handful of patients at the outpatient unit only. All other floors were empty except security guards and hospital staff doing their job. They were repeatedly disinfecting their hands with hand sanitisers. 

The Directorate General of Health Services, hospital directors and heads of departments are now holding meeting after meeting to discuss how to tackle the scourge of the pandemic. They assured the doctors that personal protective equipment (PPE) for them would arrive soon.

In a cautionary move, BSMMU anesthesia department has bought a washing machine to clean the PPEs. Everyone from doctors to cleaners of the department will be given the protective gear.

Akhtaruzzaman said, "They have been asked not to take their protective gears home."

Experts said the health workers, doctors and nurses in particular, were at a higher risk of getting infected if they did not use PPE.

In case of getting infected, a health worker will have to be in quarantine for 14 days.  If a large number of doctors were quarantined, fewer doctors will have to take on greater loads creating that would be difficult to sustain.

Already, four doctors of the Dhaka Medical College Hospital (DMCH) were advised to go on home quarantine on Wednesday for 14 days as they came into contact with COVID-19 patients.

Coronavirus outbreak in Bangladesh is in phase 2 and the confirmed cases are 18 as of today.

Demanding safety for health professionals, a noted gynecologist, Dr Rashida Begum reflected the sentiments of many when she wrote in her Facebook post, "No PPE for health workers, no treatment."