At Least 13 COVID Patients Killed In Maharashtra Hospital Fire; Second In Less Than A Month
Thirteen COVID-19 patients died in a blaze at the intensive care unit of a private hospital in Palghar district of Maharashtra on Friday.
There were 90 patients in the hospital, 18 of them in the ICU, when the fire broke out after a blast in the AC unit. The dead include five women and eight men.
What happened?
According to officials, the fire broke out in the ICU on the second floor of the four-storeyed Vijay Vallabh Hospital at Virar shortly after 3 am, an official said. Firefighters extinguished the blaze at 5.20 am.?
There were 18 patients in the ICU when the fire broke out, the official said. Five patients were rescued and shifted to other hospitals in the area
Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray has ordered a probe into the tragedy, Health Minister Rajesh Tope said.
Former BJP MP Kirit Somaiya said authorities should check if there was a fire safety audit of the hospital, which is over 50 km from Mumbai.
District Disaster Control Cell chief Vivekanand Kadam told PTI that the Virar hospital fire was preceded by an explosion in the AC unit of the intensive care unit.
Relatives of the deceased reached the hospital soon after hearing of the incident and demanded that stringent action be taken against those responsible for the tragedy.
Second fire in less than a month
This is the second fire in a COVID-19 hospital in Maharashtra in less than a month.
Last month, 11 COVID-19 patients had died after a fire broke out at the Sunrise Hospital located within the Dreamz Mall in Mumbai's Bhandup, trapping patients and staff inside.
The fire was first spotted on the first floor of the mall where shops for home decor and imitation jewellery were located and later spread to other floors.
The incident also comes just a couple of days after 22 COVID-19 patients who were either on ventilator or oxygen support, suffocated to death when their oxygen supply stopped suddenly due to a malfunction in the main storage at a civic hospital in Nashik.
Earlier this year, ten infants were killed in a fire that broke out at a special newborn care unit of the Bhandara district hospital in Maharashtra.?
