“The government has failed us. My father is no more”
Her father was corona-positive. The family kept running from pillar to post, but they didn’t get any help. This happened in Delhi
On June 4, 8 AM, there was a tweet from Amarpreet’s twitter handle: “My father has high fever. We will have to admit him to a hospital. I am waiting outside the Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Narayan Hospital. The doctors are not admitting him. He has a high fever. He is not able to breathe. He won’t survive if he does not get help.”
After 16 minutes, at 8:10, there was another tweet from the same handle.
All this happened outside New Delhi’s Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Narayan Hospital. The date was June 4, 2020. This happened on the same day people were expressing outrage on social media over the death of a pregnant elephant in Kerala. The Environment Minister, Prakash Javadekar, had tweeted about it too.
Amarpreet’s father, 68, used to live in South Delhi’s Greater Kailash.
On June 2, Amarpreet had tweeted about her father and sought Delhi government’s help. She had said that he was infected with coronavirus, but the helpline numbers were not responding. The same day she had tweeted and thanked local MLA Dilip Pandey and others.
Two days later, her father passed away.
I sent a message on Amarpreet’s handle to understand her story. Her friend, Parul, replied instantly. It was Parul who had tweeted from Amarpreet’s handle. I got Amarpreet’s husband’s number from Parul.
This is a telephonic conversation between Mandeep Singh and me:
On May 26, my father-in-law had 100 fever. On May 29, we contacted some doctors online. They gave us medicines for three days. On May 31, we went to Ganga Ram Hospital. We were told that there is congestion in his chest. His sample was taken for COVID and we were told to check the results online. We were told not to come to the hospital again and to get in touch with them if he has corona. We had to wait for three hours. It was raining heavily.
On June 1, when we saw the report, it was corona-positive. We immediately contacted the Ganga Ram Hospital, but we didn’t get any response.
Between June 1 and June 3, we went to big hospitals like Max, Safdarjung, Apollo and AIIMS. Most of the patients were sent back as they didn’t have beds. We contacted the doctors we knew, but nothing could be done.
We still didn’t get any response from Sir Ganga Ram Hospital. The Max Hospital asked us to deposit Rs 5 lakh so that they can start treatment. We contacted Delhi’s government’s helpline number. There was no reply. We tweeted and sought help. A lot of people said that if his temperature was less than 101, then we should keep him at home.
We didn’t get any help from the government. We didn’t get any help from the Arogya Setu App. No hospital was willing to admit him.
On June 3, we decided to take to a hospital. His temperature was showing 102. We contacted the Delhi Helpline number again. They asked us to reach Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Narayan Hospital. We were told there are 1,100 beds.
When we took him to the COVID block, they said we should take him to the Ganga Ram Hospital. The patient was waiting outside the emergency ward. After 15-20 minutes, my father fainted. My wife and I sought help through social media. Parul offered to tweet.
We ran towards the emergency ward and requested the doctors to admit him. They kept telling us to take him to the Ganga Ram Hospital. He was put on oxygen. He died after 15 minutes.
He was fine when he had left from home. He died within a few hours. We buried him. On June 4, the family wanted to give their samples for checking. But they didn’t get any help.
The hospital is claiming the patients had already died when he was brought to the hospital. The hospital has even issued a press release.
