KNB News Desk
Srinagar 7 July (KNB): Locals of Dal Colony of Bemina alleged absence of Doctor and trained medical staff at the Health and Wellness Centre (Sub Centre) located in Rakh-I-Arth area of Dal Colony, Bemina of central Kashmir’s Srinagar District.
Several locals of the area reached out to news agency Kashmir News Bureau and said that the Sub Centre is purposeless as neither a doctor or trained medical staff is ever present to serve the people of the area. The condition shows the dismal picture of the Sub Centre, they added.
A local, who wished not to be named, told KNB that there is no doctor available nor any qualified medical staff to attend to emergency cases.
“The Sub Centre is pointless. For the past several months, we have never seen any doctor present there. Let alone a doctor, even the staff present at the Sub-Centre does not even have the training to conduct basic medical procedures such as checking the blood pressure or giving first Aid,” he said.
“In any emergency case, like someone getting injured in an accident, the person will for sure lose his life because at the Sub Centre, there is no hope for treatment. Who will treat the one in need there? the Doctor? who has either not been appointed or just absent and abandoned his duty.” he added.
Another local said that his child’s immunization was falsely marked done at the Sub Centre.
“I had taken my child for immunization at the Sub Centre and was given a date in the month of February but due to Covid-19 situation could not make it,” he said, adding that “After Covid-19 situation eased a little, I took my child to SKIMS Soura for the same and there I was told that the immunization has already been done and the same is mentioned on my wards vaccine card.”
Such carelessness made me go through several processes and cost my time to eventually enable my child to take the necessary vaccines, he said, adding that the Sub Centre had to manually erase the false mark on the vaccine card.
As per the locals, thousands of families living in the Dal Colony—which is one of the biggest developing colonies of Srinagar—are dependent on the Health and Wellness Centre.
They said that either the concerned officials should remove the Sub Centre from the locality because it is making a mockery of it’s purpose or either make it functional the way it is supposed to be, with professionally trained medical staff as well as ensure a doctor is present at all times.
Regarding the issue, Kashmir News Bureau contacted Director Health Services, Kashmir, Dr. Mushtaq Ahmad Rather, who said, “Give it to me in writing, I’ll take up the matter with the concerned CMO/BMO and I’ll finish it off.” (KNB)