49 infants died in a month in a Farrukhabad hospital

FARRUKHABAD — Forty-nine infants died in a month in the Farrukhabad district hospital, most of them from ‘perinatal asphyxia’, a condition in which a newborn has trouble breathing, officials said on Monday.

In a virtual replay of the tragedy in Gorakhpur, where 30 children died in two days in a state-run hospital last month, many of the parents in Farrukhabad told officials there was a delay in providing the infants with oxygen and medicines.

The hospital recorded 49 deaths — 30 in neo-natal ICU and 19 during delivery — between July 20 and August 21, a government spokesperson said in Lucknow.

The state government on Monday removed Farrukhabad District Magistrate Ravindra Kumar as well as Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Umakant Pandey and Chief Medical Superintendent (CMS) Akhilesh Agarwal.

Principal secretary (health) Prashant Trivedi, however, said the deaths had “nothing to do with oxygen supply”.

“Oxygen is not an issue in the entire episode. I think, of late, we are giving undue sensitivity to oxygen. It has become more of a buzzword,” he said.

An FIR against the CMO and the CMS was registered last night in Farrukhabad, about 180km from the state capital.

However, the state government said no action would be initiated against them on the basis of the FIR.

“The way things have been presented is not what happened. No action, therefore, is being initiated on the basis of the FIR registered against the CMO and the CMS,” Trivedi said.

The Director General Medical Health would give a detailed report on the deaths, he added.

To a question on the removal of CMO Pandey and CMS Agarwal, Trivedi said, “They have been removed for the simple reason that the DM is the head of the administration in a district and they should have co-ordinated with the DM”.

If there were any issues, those should had been brought to the notice of the administration, he said.

“What happened actually — medically or technically — will be clear in a probe,” he added.

He also said that no official could elicit the views of a person over the telephone.

“This is not the right way to conduct a magisterial probe,” Trivedi said, commenting on the city magistrate contacting on the phone the parents and relatives of the infants who had died.

Principal secretary (Information) Awanish Awasthi, who was also present, said, “No death took place due to lack of oxygen. The matter should not be blown out of proportion.”

He said the DG Health would send a specialised team to investigate the deaths.

“There seems to be some co-ordinational issue among the officers. All the three officers — DM, CMO and CMS — have been removed. Everything will be brought forth,” he said.

Referring to the FIR, he said, “It very clearly seems to have been lodged when the DM did not get the report from the health department”.

The FIR was lodged against the CMO, CMS and other doctors but only the posts were mentioned and no one was named in the FIR.

A high-level team will be sent to Farrukhabad to probe the deaths and its technical aspects will also be taken care of, the official spokesperson said.

He said 468 deliveries took place in the women’s wing of the hospital during the period. Of these, 19 were stillbirths.