Patient dies in excavator on way to Myanmar hospital
An excavator was turned into an ambulance to take a patient from Manipur to the nearest hospital in Myanmar on Saturday, in yet another instance of the deplorable condition of healthcare in the country.
The patient, however, could not withstand the arduous journey and died on the way, community leaders said, alleging disparity in development between the state’s majority Meitei-dominated Imphal Valley and the surrounding hills, inhabited mostly by tribal communities.
In a country where bullock carts, handcarts, bicycles — and shoulders — are turned into mortuary vans due to lack of ambulances, 40-year-old Thangtinlen Baite got his final ride in the bucket of an excavator used to dig or remove earth.
There have been several instances in different parts of the country where kin of diseased were forced to take unusual mode of transportation to carry bodies in the absence of ambulance. But even by that standard, Baite’s case stood out for its bizarreness.
Baite, suffering from an unknown illness, belonged to New Gamnom village in Khengjoi subdivision of Manipur’s Chandel district. The village is close to India’s border with Myanmar.
His kin had the option of taking him to the nearest primary health sub-centre on the Indian side at Sehlon, about two kilometres from the village. But locals said it has had no doctor or medicine for ages. The other health sub-centre in the area — at New Somtal some 20 km away — too was of no help.
Villagers then decided to take Baite to Khampat Hospital in Myanmar in the excavator they requisitioned from a nearby construction site. He died midway to the Myanmar hospital situated 50km from New Somtal.
“There was no point in taking him to the New Somtal sub-centre as nothing works there. And the question of taking him to the nearest Indian hospital, at Moreh (Manipur) 65km away, did not arise as there is no road,” Michael Lamjathang Haokip said.
Haokip represents an association of Thadou community students. Thadou and Baite belong to the Kuki tribal group. But, as central government employee Minthang Haokip pointed out, the Moreh hospital too is in a sorry state of affairs.
“We will inquire why the patient could not get medical facilities in nearby health centres,” said a senior health official of the state.