The Hindu : New Delhi News : Infant dies after treatment by `quack'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Dec 25, 2004

New Delhi

New Delhi

Infant dies after treatment by `quack'

By Bindu Shajan Perappadan

NEW DELHI, DEC. 24. In a shocking case of negligence in the Capital, an eight-month old girl died after being treated for fever by a `quack' practicing in the Bawana area of Northwest Delhi in October.

Her post mortem report, that has been recently submitted to the police after investigations, states that the girl had died "due to anaphylactic reaction to the medicine she was injected with and that there was no sign of the `doctor' trying to resuscitate the patient, who died without the mandatory antidote for the reaction."

The post mortem report adds that the `treatment seemed to have been done by a person who has little or no knowledge of anatomy or psychology of a person, which had lead to the death of the patient."

The death, according to the doctors, should serve as a rude eye opener to the government policy makers and implementing agencies and medical councils which despite having laws in place to weed out quacks are letting as many as one person die every 10 minutes at the hands of quacks in the Capital alone.

According to the sources, the girl's father Ranjeet Kumar Saha, a resident of Shahabad Dairy, had taken the child to the Shambhu Prasad Singh's clinic operating in the area, where she was given an injection and some tablets dissolved in water for high fever. The parents were then asked to take some drugs from the chemist and continue the treatment till the child felt better at home.

At home the child's condition took a turn for the worse, with she becoming breathless and her skin developing deep red rashes. She was taken back to the `doctor', where he refused to treat her and the child died at the clinic.

The father registered a First Investigation Report (number 385), with the Bawana police station and the `doctor' booked under 304-A (culpable homicide not amounting to murder).

What is shocking is the fact that the `treating doctor' was operating in the area with an invalid degree.

"Delhi has an estimated over 40,000 quacks operating in the Capital and what we are amazed at is the fact that the quack should have been booked under 304 where he does not get out on bail.

The police is yet to ask the Medical Council of India (MCI) for any report on the quack, who is out on bail and back in business. Also, the Council and Association have not taken note of the case seriously, which will lead to many more such deaths being swept under the carpet in nexus with the police and other law implementing agencies," explained member Delhi Medical Council (DMC), Anil Bansal.

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