Port Blair, Aug 20: Glaring examples of negligence in health care at the Islands’ only referral hospital have been coming to light. The incidents where in, delayed response for ambulances, unequipped ambulances and no immediate check by the health officials at the GB Pant upon arrival at the hospital is something that can be termed as negligence.

The collapse of GB Pant has been a result of failure in strategic planning by the authorities to combat the present COVID-19 pandemic. People have been pointing out that whatever steps that have been taken to control the pandemic was more focussed on pleasing the centre than for the welfare of the islanders.

There are questions being raised as to why the COVID-19 deaths are confined to GB Pant Hospital, while other COVID Care Centres established by the Administration has been witnessing drastic cures.  Why is that the Covid Care Centres at Circuit House and other convenient places restricted to the ‘chosen ones’, while the common islanders are being pushed to death at GB Pant? The question also remains as to why the Corona affected patients of INHS Dhanwantri have been successfully recovering, while the mortality rate at GB Pant is at its peak?

The Mortuary of GB Pant is overcrowded with bodies getting rotten. There have also been cases wherein bodies have were misplaced. Records of cremation centre at Junglighat show more than a hundred deaths in the month of August 2020 and there are many more, which have been recorded in other cremation grounds. Why is that the Administration’s Official COVID-19 bulletin has tailor made figures? Is it to please the centre and prove that things are under control under the able management of the present Administration?

There are many more questions that are being raised on the management of Covid patients in GB Pant, which perhaps will never get a proper answer. The only thing Andaman Chronicle wishes to remind the Andaman & Nicobar Administration at this juncture is to understand that all lives are precious and the islanders demand equal care and attention for all patients and not only to the ‘Chosen Ones’. It’s high time to accept and rectify the mistake done, before the islands are turned into a mass graveyard or before the peace loving islanders take law and order in their hands for the sake of their loved ones.