Gandhi Hospital, a fire death trap, say doctors

The 2,200 bed strong Gandhi Hospital is literally a fire trap, as the fire equipment in the hospital are non-functional, raising a safety concern in patients and staff alike.

The first floor houses five fire extinguishers which are either non functional or not up to the mark. Around 200 people undergo treatment any point of time and such inadequacies endanger the lives of these patients.

Dr P Shravan Kumar, Superintendent, Gandhi Hospital, admits that the hospital, housed in an eight-storey building and with over 2,200 inpatients on any given day, has had non-functional fire fighting equipment for the past two years.

“The Telangana State Medical Services and Infrastructure Development Corporation (TSMSIDC) inspected the hospital six months ago for fire systems and the corporation alerted the government about the poor firefighting mechanism at the hospital.” said Dr Kumar.

A visit to the hospital reveals several lapses. There is no “out escape” or the staircase which leads to the outside of the hospital. There is no staircase which opens outside the campus, as needed for an emergency exit from the building.

Dr Kumar says that he approached the authorities six months back but “have got no response from any official. I worry that if there is any fire, escape is going to difficult.”

Srinivas Reddy, District Fire Officer, assured that an inspection would be carried out by August. Asked about the lack of fire fighting equipment, he said, “We were focusing on industries this summer and did not conduct any inspection at the hospital.”