Diphtheria kills 12 children in 13 days in two govt hospitals
NEW DELHI: At least 12 children have died in 13 days — between September 6 and 19 — of diphtheria in two government hospitals in Delhi.
Diphtheria is a contagious bacterial infection that affects the mucous membranes of the throat and nose,
Eleven children have died in the North Delhi Municipal Corporation-run Maharishi Valmiki Infectious Diseases Hospital and one child died in the Delhi government-run Lok Nayak Hospital.
Of the 300 cases reported so far this year, 85 people were admitted with the bacterial infection at the Valmiki Hospital from September 1 to September 19, hospital authorities said. Valmiki hospital specialises in treating infectious diseases.
“It is not unusual for cases of diphtheria to spike around this time of the year. In fact, the total deaths this year so far are fewer than the previous year, ” said Dr SK Gupta, medical superintendent of Valmiki hospital.
Last year, 120 cases were reported in the month of September, out of 550 cases during the entire year. Seventy people had succumbed to the disease, of which 15 had died in September.
Till September 19 this year, 30 children between the age of one and nine years have died in the hospital. Eleven of the deaths took place between September 1 and September 19.
“The mortality related to the disease is usually 15% and these children come to us quite late when they usually do not respond to drugs,” said Gupta.
Most of the admitted children were from outside Delhi, from areas of western Uttar Pradesh, like Khurja and from Bulandshahr district and Muzaffarnagar. Of the 11 deaths , only one child belongs to Delhi.
The disease is preventable as there is a vaccine that government provides free under its universal immunisation programme.
Three doses at 1.5 months, 2.5 months and 3.5 months are to be given and a booster shot at 1.5 years to prevent catching the infection. NEWDELHI: The Delhi commission for Women on Thursday asked police to file a status report in four days in the case of the 52-year-old mentally unstable woman who was rescued from a terrace in Rohini on Tuesday.
The commission had earlier also issued a notice to Delhi Police asking them why a couple,who had confined a 52-year-old woman for the last two years, was yet to be arrested.
Police, in reply, said they had arrested the couple but the two were released on bail as the offence is bailable.
On Tuesday, the commission had rescued the mentally challenged woman from the terrace of a building in Rohini sector 7 where Sunil Lamba and his wife Annapurna live . Police said the rescued woman Poonam Lamba is Sunil’s younger sister.
Officials from the commission said Poonam, currently admitted at the Baba Saheb Ambedkar hospital, would be shifted to Apollo hospital for better treatment. Police claim Sunil and Annapurna was arrested on the day the woman was rescued but they were let out on bail as the offences were bailable. The couple was booked for ‘wrongful confinement of an individual for ten or more days.’
“The Commission has been informed that the accused brother and his wife in the case have not been arrested till date and are threatening the lady in the hospital not to pursue the case. The concerned officials must provide current status report and reasons for not arresting the accused in the matter,” the DCW letter reads.
Police have also been asked to provide details of the steps they have taken to ensure the woman’s safety
DCP (Rohini) Rajneesh Gupta, said, “We had registered a case under sections 344 and 34 and arrested the woman’s brother and his wife. Since these are bailable offences, the couple was let out on bail.”