Plea at Delhi HC to designate hospitals for COVID treatment of children, people with special needs

The Delhi High Court on Wednesday sought a response on a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) seeking direction to designate five hospitals in the national capital where children or people with special needs can be taken for treatment where they may not be denied admission or treatment for the reason that they were unable to provide their SPO2 levels or lung CT scan.

The Bench of two judges - Justice DN Patel and Justice Jasmeet Singh - on Wednesday issued notice to respondents and listed the matter for further hearing on May 25.

The petitioner Anshumaan Sahni, social activist, through advocate Ravi Gupta stated that such persons should be taken into emergency and must be provided with immediate medical care. Such persons should not be refused medical treatment for any reason whatsoever.

The plea stated, "It is disheartening to see parents of such persons children try to treat them at home without much luck as neither do they allow the oximeter to be put on them nor do they allow an oxygen concentrator mask to be put on them, nor do they allow anybody to take a nasal swab for an RT PCR test nor do they let a CT scan be done and without this information, the hospitals are not entertaining/admitting them. It is imperative that persons/children with special needs get medical attention in a hospital in an emergency situation in that they not be denied medical treatment."

It also mentioned that with the current sudden and deadly second wave of COVID-19 infections are raging in the capital city and medical setup has been overburdened to the point of collapse. Disturbing facts have also come in this regard. During COVID-19 hospitals are asking for the Oxygen (SPO2) levels of the patient and for a CT scan of the patient before administering the treatment /admitting them to the hospital.

The earlier requirement of mandatorily producing a positive RT-PCR report has as recently as one weeks ago, been done away with, after the intervention of this Court, wherein the GNCTD submitted that "a patient with steady symptoms of COVID-19 does not need an RT-PCR Report to get admitted in a Delhi hospital". However, the requirement of SPO2 and CT Scan remains in operation to see the severity of the spread of infection in a person and deciding medical treatment accordingly, the plea said.

( With inputs from ANI )