Gadchiroli Aug. 3 (District Correspondent) In yet another incident, a youth from a remote village of Pendulwahi in Etapalli taluka was to be taken to a hospital on a cot covering a distance of around 3 kilometres walking through dense forest, as no ambulance was available in the village.
The incident took place on Aug. 2 last thereby bringing to fore the terrific situation of health services and roads in the district which is ‘marching towards becoming a steel hub of the country’.
Such pitiable incidents have been taking place in the remote areas of the district for the last several years where the patients have to be admitted in the hospitals crossing the knee-deep water of the rivers and nullahs in the way. This year’s incident has been added to this pathetic story once again. During the last monsoon itself, a pregnant woman was also to be shifted to the hospital for her delivery in a bucket of a JCB machine in want of a bridge on the nullah.
A youth of Pendulwahi village one Maniram Hichami (35), was badly injured as he fell in the mud while driving a tractor in his field for the transplantation of paddy plants. As there is no pucca road in this village to travel to nearest Primary Health Center of Jarawandi, the relatives of the youth were forced to shift the youth on a cot holding it on their shoulders and walking a distance of 3 kilometres to reach the PHC.
Meanwhile, the health department of the Zilla Parishad has admitted that the patient was taken on a ‘kawad’ of cot from the field to the main road and further shifted to the PHC in a private vehicle of the health employee. As the vehicle of the Jarawandi PHC was engaged in admitting the other patients to Gadchiroli hospital, Maniram Hichami was shifted to Jarawandi in a private vehicle from where he was again shifted to the district hospital, clarified Dr. Pratap shinde, District Health Officer.
Meanwhile a video of the patient being taken on shoulders on a cot walking through the dense forest has gone viral on social media platforms and the people and the people have expressed their strong anger and disappointment over the incident.
