How To Cease Fire At Hosps Without Safety Equipment?

VARANASI: The Shri Shiv Prasad Gupta (SSPG) Divisional Hospital and Deen Dayal Upadhyay (DDU) District Hospital exhibit a very careless attitude towards safety of the patients as both the hospitals lack proper fire safety measures.
The hospital staff of the SSPG Divisional Hospital is clueless about the location of fire fighting equipment and fire extinguishers in the hospital premises.Even the fire buckets kept outside the emergency ward have been damaged and many have been stolen by miscreants.
In the DDU District Hospital, the expiry date of fire extinguisher was of December 2012 and the hospital administration has yet not taken any pains to change it. Besides, the safety of entire hospital is dependent on only one small fire extinguisher the location of which is not known to even the para-medical staff of the hospital. The only fire extinguisher present in the hospital for the fire safety is located in the duty room of the para-medical staff in "emergency ward" with an expiry date of February 2014 mentioned on it.
Moreover, there are no fire dampers, fire alarms, fire detection and basic fire fighting equipment available in the hospital.
According to Dr AK Srivastava, medical superintendent, the hospital abides by the rules and regulations set by the state government and so far there have been no directions and guidelines regarding fire safety given by the government. As soon as any guideline will come, the hospital will make arrangement for fire safety in its premises; he said further adding that at present fire extinguishers were installed at Emergency ward, Operation Theatre and Drug Store House.
However, when TOI visited these areas to locate fire extinguishers, only one was found hanging in the duty room of the nurses in "emergency ward." Shockingly the nursing and para-medical staff in the Emergency ward was found unaware of not only the existence of fire extinguisher but also its proper use.
On the contrary, the Indian Public Health Standards (IPHS) has proper guidelines for installation of fire extinguishers in hospitals. The ministry of urban development also has guidelines for fire protection and fire safety equipments in buildings including hospitals.
It may be noted here that the SSPG Divisional Hospital is one of the largest government hospital in the district. Patients, not only from Varanasi and adjacent districts but even from Bihar and Jharkhand come here for treatment.
According to the doctors and hospital staff, several attempts were made earlier to introduce fire safety arrangements in the hospital, but all in vain. "In every big hospital there are arrangements for the wet riser, hose reel, fire hydrants and fire buckets for fire safety but even these basic facilities are missing here. Earlier, officials twice visited the hospital in view of providing advanced fire safety services here, but the proceedings could not reach beyond floating of tenders," said a doctor of the hospital.
Fire brigade office, Chetganj, on issuing a written letter by the hospital administration, sends the officials to verify the fire safety norms and standards being followed in the hospital once in a year. The fire brigade department also took no notice of negligence regarding fire safety measures in the hospital.