A video showing an unidentified woman lying on the roadside after giving birth to a stillborn baby in Telangana’s Medchal district is being shared widely on social media. The video taken on Monday shows that the woman gave birth to a child barely 200 meters away from a Public Health Centre (PHC) at Balaji Nagar of Jawaharnagar town.
Medchal health department officials on Tuesday told TNM that the woman, identified as 30-year-old Lakshmi, had approached the hospital for a different ailment but gave birth after leaving its premises. The officer said she was administered medical aid and later shifted to Gandhi hospital.
An unidentified youth who took the video had claimed he had reached out to 108 emergency services but did not receive a response for over an hour. “No one has bothered to look at her,” the youth said, who then proceeded to take a tour of the hospital premises which had two ambulances on standby but without any drivers.
The doors to the PHC also appeared locked. “She has delivered a baby who has died. There's no one here. This is the situation here in Jawahar Nagar. The woman is conscious, but not talking,” he added.
#Medchal health officials say the woman identified as Lakshmi visited PHC with complaints about filariasis on her left leg. No doctor at hospital, only one nurse who says she was unaware about labour pain.Inquiry on pic.twitter.com/NJh4drM9SK
— Mithun MK (@KalkiSpeaks) March 30, 2021
Speaking to TNM, Dr Narayan Rao, District Medical Health Officer (DMHO) Medchal said, “The police have informed us that Lakshmi was into begging and had no permanent home, she is a nomad. She was first found resting under a tree within the hospital premises on Monday.”
Some time past 11.30 am, the only on-duty nurse at the hospital approached Lakshmi, asking her to wait inside the hospital to meet the doctor. There was no doctor present at the hospital at the time. The officer said Lakshmi had visited the hospital with complaints about pain in the left leg due to filariasis, a parasitic disease.
“Lakshmi did not approach the hospital with complaints about labour. The nurse did not know that the woman was in labour. She insisted on being administered medicines and said will be waiting outside the hospital premises for her sister,” said Rao.” It then became lunchtime and the nurse who resides nearby left to have lunch. That was when Lakshmi gave birth and the video was taken,” said the Medchal DMHO, who added that the baby was stillborn. “The baby had been dead inside her womb for the past four days. It was stillbirth. We shifted her to Gandhi hospital for further treatment and are still investigating,” he added.
The DMHO claimed he will carry out a detailed inquiry to ascertain the facts. “The details I have are based on the interaction I had with the staff nurse. We are heading to Gandhi hospital to talk to the woman and verify the facts of what has happened. So far no relative has come forward,” he added.
The official said there was no doctor present at the hospital at the time of the incident on Monday. "The doctor was on leave as there was a family emergency. He had taken permission that day morning to attend to his personal matter. Another doctor who was to replace him was enroute to the hospital at the time of the incident,” said Rao, who added that there PHC has a sanctioned strength of 12 staff, but only six people are working at the hospital. “There was less staff as it was a holiday due to Holi,” he added.