15 students from the Osmania Nursing Hostel were hospitalized for food poisoning on Friday, after many complained of vomiting, stomach-ache, diarrhea and weakness after eating dinner on Friday night. Most of them were immediately shifted to the acute medical ward in Osmania General Hospital.
Sub-Inspector Raghavendra from Afzalgunj Police Station rushed to Osmania hospital on Saturday after he heard the news of so many nursing students being hospitalised. He told The News Minute ‘’When I reached the hospital I found many students hospitalized. But no one gave a complaint as the RMO (Resident Medical Officer) of the nursing school came and clarified the issue.”
The RMO of Osmania Hospital, Dr Mohammad Rafi, said that of the 40 to 60 people who ate dinner at the hostel that evening, 15 students were hospitalized the next day. “Here in the hostels, generally food is cooked a little early, and on that day students ate their dinner really late because of which the food must have got spoilt as a result of the extreme summer heat. The hospitalized students are stable now and some were discharged on Sunday, and a few others on Monday’’.
While the authorities of the college are blaming the extreme summer heat, students alleged that the incident occurred because of poor hygienic conditions in the kitchen and hostel premises. Students claim that workers don’t use proper drinking water to cook food.
Swarna (name changed on request) one of the nursing students said, “Workers generally use tap water to cook food for us, due to which we always suffer. This is not the first time we are suffering because of the hostel food; we students always hear about poor hostel food in every hostel, but ours is the worst.”
Another student claimed that the cooking area is also maintained in an unhygienic manner. that “They hardly clean the kitchen due to which these kind of things happen. This is not the first time — we have all heard many cases in the past where hostel students suffered because of the poor mess food and unhygienic hostel premises. Though our hostel mates are stable now and also discharged from the hospital, this situation could happen all over again in the future’’.