Anantnag: A staff of 82, including twenty doctors and 62 paramedics, is working tirelessly at Anantnag’s new Covid-19 hospital here in Bijbehara, which was an empty building handed over to them and still has not a single ventilator in place.

The building, situated along the old national highway, was meant to be a Trauma hospital and was sanctioned in 2008, along with 11 other hospitals sanctioned to be built along the same highway. The construction work on it started in 2013 and until recently the building was held by the executing agency, Jammu and Kashmir Projects Construction Corporation (JKPCC).

The JKPCC had set a deadline of April this year to hand the building over to the health department but in March, after the Covid-19 outbreak, it was turned into a quarantine centre.

Now the authorities have declared it to be the designated Covid-19 hospital of Anantnag district. About 30 people are currently admitted at the hospital, which has almost no logistics in place to qualify as a hospital.

“Twenty of the admitted patients have already tested negative and for the rest the results are awaited. Some of the persons admitted have symptoms of Covid-19 and are being treated by the doctors here,” sources at the hospital told Kashmir Reader.

The doctors and the paramedics, who have to work all 7 days a week at the hospital, will need a 14-day administrative quarantine before they leave the hospital and go back home, according to their duty roaster. However, the doctors have made no complaints whatsoever about such demanding work conditions.

“We are trying to lift each other’s spirit in this time of crisis, rather than complaining about things,” a senior doctor at the hospital said. “That is how we can stay afloat in this time.”

The hospital is also a sampling centre and the staff at the hospital has been all praise for two medical workers, Gulzar Ahmad and Muzaffar Ahmad.

“These two persons have been collecting 40 to 50 samples a day for the past several days now. They are doing a fantastic job,” doctors and paramedics at the hospital said.

“We are keeping ourselves prepared for (future) as well,” the doctors said.

Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Anantnag, Dr Mukhtar Ahmad, told Kashmir Reader that the hospital is well-equipped for now.

“It is a level first hospital and we do not need any ventilators for now. if any complications take place the patients can be sent to Srinagar hospitals for specialised care,” the CMO said.

Suhail A Shah