LUCKNOW: After being pulled up twice for not responding satisfactorily to its queries regarding the death of five patients allegedly due to oxygen shortage during the second wave of Covid in April, the UP State Human Rights Commission (UPSHRC) has now decided to summon an official of the Ram Manohar Lohia Institute of Medical Sciences (RMLIMS) for proper explanation.
On Monday, when the Commission went through RMLIMS’s reply on the second warning, it found that the institute had explained the death of only two patients and not answered specific queries.
“The institute has not explained to the Commission on who the remaining three patients were, how they died and who is to be held responsible for it. The Commission has now decided to summon a member of the institute’s internal committee to be physically present before it for proper answers and explanation,” a member of UPSHRC, OP Dixit, told TOI. He said the reply from RMLIMS stated that one of the patients who died was an elderly man suffering from the last stage of cancer and could not be saved because of the severity of his illness.
“The other death (in April) was of a female patient. The reply states that the death occurred around 3am while oxygen supply dropped at 5.30am. So both these deaths, RMLIMS has said, were not because of the dip in oxygen level. But RMLIMS fails to give reply on remaining three patients and all other questions put up by the Commission on fixing of responsibility,” he said.
