SHC directs public and private hospitals to continue OPDs

KARACHI: The Sindh High Court (SHC) on Wednesday directed the city’s public and private hospitals to continue their OPDs, first aid and emergency services in the larger public interest. The direction came on a petition seeking direction to hospitals for providing first aid to every patient at initial stage without calling/asking for producing the Covid-19 test.

Assistant Director Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Center and deputy medical superintendent Civil Hospital submitted that their hospitals were providing outdoor patient services and emergency services to patients and sought time to file comments.

The counsel of private hospitals, including Aga Khan University, Liaquat National and South City hospitals, also submitted that their hospitals were already operating emergency services and outdoor patient services taking precautionary measures in the wake of Covid-19 and sought time to reply. The SHC’s division bench, headed by Justice Mohammad Ali Mazhar, observed that none have appeared on behalf of Ziauddin Hospital, National Medical Center and Abbasi Shaheed Hospital and repeated notices to them for filing the comments.

The federal law officer also sought time to file comments on the behalf of federal Ministry of Health.

Petitioners Asim Iqbal and Nadeem Sheikh, advocates, had filed the petition in the SHC that all public and private sector hospitals are duty bound to provide basic emergency medical care and injured persons and other patients have the right to get emergency medical treatment and care. They submitted that it has been noticed that during the Covid-19 pandemic whenever any patient approaches doctors and/or hospital in emergency situation for treatment of any kind of disease except Covid-19, the doctors and paramedical staffs available at the clinics/hospitals avoid providing first aid to patients and ask patients for coronavirus test results, which not only delays the medical treatment but also causes death of several patients.

They submitted that private and public sector hospitals have also closed the general OPDs for patients suffering from different ailments and they were not treating normal disease patients. They submitted that refusal to treat patients in the absence of corona virus test is amounting to refusal to treat a patient and provide him/her basic fundamental facility on urgent basis, which is causing death of patients for not getting timely intervention of hospitals and doctors.

The court was requested to direct the Ministry of Health to immediately investigate the matter and take stern action against the hospitals/doctors who were found involved in denying first aid medical treatment to patients in absence of coronavirus test results.