Odisha: Battle with disease & stress resumes for health workers

BHUBANESWAR: After fighting a year-long battle against the virus, getting infected, living in fear of spreading it to family and watching patients succumb, frontline healthcare workers have started feeling the pressure again as Covid-19 cases rise fast.
“Covid wards have reopened and patients have started pouring in, as ours is a premier institute. Even after a year, the disease remains unpredictable and the situation is fast-changing. The situation is going to be more serious in the coming days,” said a senior resident doctor at AIIMS here.
After a large number of doctors and staff in the institute got infected, AIIMS decided to close down the outdoor patient department (OPD) from April 25. “If more staff gets infected, the treatment of critical and indoor patients will get affected,” he said.
At Capital Hospital, where nearly 2,000 samples are being collected every day, five doctors, several nurses and some other staffs have been infected with the virus in the past one week. “Though there is no Covid ward in our hospital, every day thousands of patients are coming for Covid test and vaccination. We have vaccinated all our healthcare workers but still there are high chances of infection and this is causing stress among staff. The rise in infection level will affect the whole system,” said deputy superintendent of the hospital, Dhananjay Das.
The healthcare workers who had attended patients last year said, in the second wave, the disease is more severe. “It is both mentally and physically draining to attend to Covid patients wearing PPE kits for long hours. We live in constant fear of contracting the virus and passing it on to family. Staying away from the family in this difficult situation is also painful and depressing. More traumatic is when patients die in front of you despite all your efforts,” said Ayaskant Sahu, a critical care specialist.
The situation is worse for healthcare workers like anganwadi workers and ANMs (Auxiliary Nurse Midwives), who have been engaged in door to door survey of patients. They lamented lack of protective instruments like gloves, masks and sanitisers as they are moving in the field.
Each anganwadi worker is given one glove for one hand, one disposable mask and 100 ml sanitiser for the whole week. “People are not taking the virus seriously but without proper instrument we are risking our lives,” said Kunja Lata Biswal, an anganwadi worker in Jagatsinghpur district.
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