Adya Singh was admitted to Fortis Hospital on August 31 with severe dengue, and died a fortnight later
A police case has been registered against a senior doctor at Gurgaon's Fortis Hospital for allegedly causing the death of the seven-year-old girl admitted to the hospital for treatment of dengue.
The case was registered on a complaint from the Haryana government's medical department on Sunday after an inquiry indicted the upscale private hospital near national capital Delhi
for several lapses and overbilling.A key lapse detailed in this inquiry was that
when the family wanted the girl to be taken to another hospital against medical advice, the doctor withdrew her ventilator and sent her in an ordinary ambulance. Haryana Health Minister Anil Vij said this had become the cause of her death.
"In simple words, it was not a death, it was a murder," the state's health minister Anil Vij had declared this week, promising that a case would be registered against the hospital.
The girl, admitted to Fortis on August 31 with severe dengue, died on September 14.
A Gurgaon police officer told NDTV that the case registered today in connection with the girl's death did not list the hospital management as accused but named a pediatrician who treated Adya.
But trouble is mounting for the hospital.
The government inquiry into the death had revealed that there were other violations as well. For instance, the hospital had been granted land in 2004 on the condition that it would reserve 20 per cent of the beds for the poor. Health Minister Anil Vij says the inquiry found that this condition wasn't being met.
The circumstances around Adya's death had first come to light after her family complained about the hospital overcharging them for the treatment.
A 41-page inquiry report found merit in this part of his father's complaint, noting that the hospital is guilty of "negligence, unethical and unlawful acts". It said the hospital had made up to 108 per cent profit on medicines given to the girl and
some of the consumables used by the hospital were overcharged by 717 per cent.The Haryana government hasn't specified the legal provisions under which action would be taken against the hospital for overbilling.
In a statement later, the hospital said it had learnt from media reports that a police case had been filed at Gurgaon's Sushant Lok police station. "We are yet to receive a copy of the FIR or the full Inquiry report of the committee deputed by the state," the hospital said, stressing that it could comment only after receiving the report.