By P.T. Bopanna
Incidents involving Covid patients in Karnataka’s Kodagu (Coorg) district have become scandalous and shows the district administration in poor light.
Even as death toll mounts in the hill district mainly due to shortage of staff in the government designated hospital at Madikeri, the scandalous behaviour of the staff in Covid hospitals in the district has led to panic among the residents of Kodagu.
According to reports, Ponnamma (60) was discharged from the designated Covid hospital on Sunday noon after she recovered. Without informing the relatives of Ponnamma, she was ferried in an ambulance. The driver allegedly asked her to alight at Aiguru junction in Kiraganduru village, a good 2 km away from her house.
Her family member Vinu Kushalappa was shocked to learn the ordeal Ponnamma had to endure, that too after being discharged from hospital. Vinu was quoted as saying that the control room was in touch with the family when she was being treated, but failed to inform when she was discharged.
This comes close on the heels of another heart-wrenching incident involving Hrithiksha, the 9-year-old daughter of a daily wage worker in Kushalnagar who lost her mother Prabha on May 16 after she succumbed to Covid at the designated hospital in Madikeri.
While returning the belongings of Prabha, the hospital authorities informed that the mobile phone was missing. This broke the heart of Hrithiksha as she had stored many of the photographs of her mother in the phone. Her appeal for restoring the phone which had “memories” of her mother went viral on the social media.
There are several other incidents involving thefts involving the Covid hospital at Madikeri.
The Karnataka government should immediately intervene and take remedial measures to restore confidence among the people of Kodagu.