india

Updated: Jul 14, 2019 12:14 IST

At a time when government-run medical institutions in Odisha are in the news over deficiencies in providing quality medical service, an Odisha IAS officer has chosen a government hospital in a Maoist-affected district for his wife’s childbirth.

Malkangiri district collector Manish Agarwal’s wife Sonam gave birth to a boy at the district headquarters hospital on Friday.

“We had done pre-natal check-ups at the district headquarters hospital. Since medical facilities have improved we thought why not do the delivery at the hospital itself instead of running here and there. The facilities in Malkangiri and other local private hospitals have similar facilities,” said Agarwal, adding that his wife and son were doing fine.

The state health and family welfare department tweeted the photo of the collector and his wife with the newborn.

District Collector walks the talk. When it comes to faith in public health systems, Shri Manish Agarwal, Collector & DM Malkangiri, prefers his child to be born in Govt Headquarter Hospital, Malkangiri. 1/2 pic.twitter.com/OAb3EEZoSi — H & FW Dept Odisha (@HFWOdisha) July 13, 2019

Agarwal said he was satisfied by the improvements in the medical infrastructure in the district headquarters hospital that was in the news in 2016 when 103 children died of acute encephalitis.

“We now have oxygen concentrators, ICUs and SNCUs. We have more doctors and added to the expertise of the doctors. All this has led to definite improvement. From 60 per cent institutional delivery in 2016, we have now close to 90 per cent,” he said.

In 2017, district collector A Murali of Bhupalpalli district in Telangana had admitted his daughter at a government hospital for C-section delivery.

Malkangiri still has huge vacancies for doctors and other paramedical staff. At least 60% posts of doctors and 48% nursing posts are vacant in the Maoist-affected district.

Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik too has been using the state-run Capital hospital in Bhubaneswar for treatment of some of his ailments. Last month, he did a dental procedure at the hospital.

Patnaik and Agarwal’s visit to the government hospital may have been smooth, but for many common people a visit to a government hospital is fraught with risk.

In September last year, a 37-year-old man complaining of chest pain died in the district headquarters hospital of kept quarreling among themselves.