Srinagar: Family members of Kashmir’s first coronavirus victim took to social media to contest the doctors’ version’, claiming that they had indeed disclosed the patient’s travel history but doctors refused screening for the COVID-19.
“Doctors refused to screen him for coronavirus in view of no international travel (as was the guidelines that time)”, according to a post by Zafar Anim, who was accompanying the patient, a resident of Hyderpora Srinagar, during the visits to the hospital.
Anim wrote that doctors on March 21 advised hospitalisation or “management at home in view of corona problem in the hospital” after which we decided “to manage at home but he was deteriorating at home once I saw him next morning. That is when he was taken to SMHS and referred to the Chest Diseases Hospital thereafter”.
According to doctor Khan Khawar Achakzai, in charge of the emergency ward at SMHS that day, the attendant had not disclosed the full travel history of the patient. “He was seen by my junior and asked about travel history (to which he had replied ‘Delhi se 12 din pehle aaya),” he wrote on Facebook responding to a string of messages targeting him for his previous tweets.
Achakzai wrote that doctors at SKIMS Bemina had recorded “strong suspicion for COVID-19 infection” and sent him to SKIMS, Soura for further testing where the attendant sought meeting with a senior doctor when advised to go for admission to hospital for quarantine.
Accusing the attendant of hiding travel history, Achakzai said that “He had taken the patient all over the hospital (active diseased patient) looking for the Head of Infections but in vain because he was busy in a meeting with Director regarding the pandemic,” he wrote.
