9-Year-Old Girl Dies From Dengue in Delhi, Family Alleges Ill-Treatment

New Delhi: A nine-year-old girl is the latest victim of dengue in the national capital. She died at the Fortis Hospital in Vasant Kunj after being diagnosed with dengue on September 24. Nishtha Taneja's family alleges, like many other children before her this season, she is also a victim of ill-treatment at a Delhi hospital.

As soon as Nishtha's blood report showed that she had dengue, her parents first took her to Madan Mohan Malviya hospital nearby, which gave them some medicines, but did not admit her.

When she was taken to Saket Hospital, the child again could not be admitted as there were no beds available. Following which, Nishtha's parents took her to Sawan Neelu Angel's nursing home, located in Saket, where she was finally admitted to the dengue ward.

At the time of admission, her platelets were at 96,000. But even after a day's treatment, Nishtha's platelet count continued to fall, and ended up at 36,000 by the evening of September 25, a statement from the hospital said.

Nishtha was "stable till September 25 evening, but suddenly developed dengue shock syndrome. We gave her extra IV fluids initially to control the shock and managed a bed in the ICU of Fortis Vasant Kunj and shifted her", the statement said.

But Nishtha could not hold on for too long. She was brought to Fortis Hospital at 10 pm, but died past midnight.

Nishtha's grief-stricken parents, who are still coming to terms with her death, blame the lack of proper treatment at the hospital which admitted her. Her father Sunil Taneja asks, "Why did they not monitor her platelets properly, and transfuse platelets on time, since they knew she was such a small child and more vulnerable to the disease?"

Nishtha is the 29th patient who has died from dengue in Delhi this season. The Delhi government claims that all hospitals in the city have been told to tackle Dengue on a war footing, with no hospital being allowed to turn back a dengue patient.