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Fourteen patients of Chennai’s MIOT hospital who were on ventilator support died over the last three days, Tamil Nadu’s health secretary confirmed to CNN-IBN on Friday. However, he denied that power failure affected ventilators, thereby causing death.
Speaking to CNN-IBN Tamil Nadu health Secretary J Radhakrishnan said that 14 people had died in the last three days, but denied that it was due to power failure.
He said that patients come to the super-specialty hospital under “highly critical conditions” and indirectly suggested that that may have been the reason for their deaths.
“If (they had died due to pallegeower failure affecting oxygen cylinders), the other 57 patients too would have died,” he told the news channel. He added that the deceased patients were undergoing various super-specialty treatments.
According to The Indian Express reporter Arun Janardhan, patients have alleged that the deaths occurred two days ago and that there was a cover-up. He tweeted:
Son of a #MIOTvictim says his dad was healthy, "he chose medicines instead of surgery, V forced him" @IndianExpress pic.twitter.com/MDYAc4XIZ8
— Arun Janardhanan (@arunjei) December 4, 2015
Families of MIOT victim allege the deaths happened 2days ago it was covered up. Bodies brought 2 govt hosptl frm Thu night @IndianExpress
— Arun Janardhanan (@arunjei) December 4, 2015
Police report say 14 ICU patients died at MIOT hospital on Thursday night due to failure of power and oxygn cylenders @IndianExpress
— Arun Janardhanan (@arunjei) December 4, 2015According to The Indian Express live feed of the situation in Chennai, the patients who died are: Chokkalingam from Kovilambakkam Mohan, 57 Vadivel, 35 Kathir Thomas, 80 Ratnaraj from Vyasarpady Raghupathy Raj, 67 from Teynampet Vishalakshi, 74, Adyar SP Kalayaraj, Annanur Premalatha, 44 Chellamal, Velachery Wilson, Ranipet Paramjyothi, 73, Puthupet in Chennai Venkatramanan Vikram.
The Indian Express also said that when Prakash, attempted to meet his friend Vadivel on Thursday, he was turned away by hospital authorities. He learned that his friend was dead at 10 pm that day.
On Wednesday, NDTV had reported that hospital staff had left after water levels receded. No one from the hospital could be reached as phones were not working. Jaffer, a relative of a patient had told The News Minute that the patient had reached home on Thursday afternoon by taking a government bus.
Jaffer said that his sister’in-law’s father had been admitted to the hospital and that they had just reached home. He said they took a government bus from the hospital, which is located in Porur, to their house in the Avadi area of the city. However, he did not have any information on whether the doctors had abandoned the patients.
Radhakrishnan also said that a total of 575 patients who were at the hospital had been shifted to either private or government hospitals nearby. He said that there were 57 other patients on ventilator support who had also been shifted to hospitals nearby. The bodies of the deceased patients have been moved to mortuaries in nearby hospitals.
According to latest figures, 18 patients have died in the hospital.