MYSORE: The 50-bed Beedi Workers Welfare Fund Central Hospital (BWWFCH), which is housed in a spacious location of Azeez Sait Nagar, will be upgraded soon.

Chief Medical Officer Raveendranatha Sahu told The Hindu that a Rs. 25-lakh proposal for upgradation of the hospital had been sent to the Government in January and was awaiting clearance. He said that the upgradation plans included a modernisation of the laboratory and the purchase of new, modern equipment.

Mr. Sahu said, however, that there were no plans to increase the number of beds, as the existing facilities would be sufficient to meet the needs of the more than 90,000 beedi workers who were receiving free treatment at the hospital. With the upgradation, beedi workers with major health problems, who were being sent to Mysore Medical College (MMC) for investigation, could get it done from now on at the hospital.

"Owing to the lack of infrastructure and modern equipment, we were not in a position until now to investigate major cases," he added.

He said that the present occupancy in the hospital was 80 per cent. On an average, 500 patients were visiting the hospital daily, he added.

Treatments

When the hospital had been established, it had only 10 beds. The number was increased to 50 after it was shifted to its present location in 1992. People suffering from heart and kidney problems, diabetes, blood-pressure problems, arthritis and asthma were visiting the hospital and being treated by experts, Mr. Sahu said.

Some beedi workers, however, have complaints against the quality of treatment they receive at the hospital. "When we take our children for treatment, they demand that their birth certificates be produced.

But many of us have not obtained the birth certificates issued by the City Corporation as we had been ignorant about them," said Shaheen Taj (48), a resident of Azeez Sait Nagar. Famida Banu (34) said that doctors were not treating her son Salman (11), who was a polio patient.

Mohammad Ali, a social worker in Azeez Sait Nagar, said that many beedi workers were not aware of the requirements demanded by the hospital, and, therefore, were not getting treatment. "We have brought this to the notice of the authorities, who have promised to sort out the issue," he said.

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