Tag: FireSafety

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Fire Safety Healthcare

Indian Hospital Fires in the last few months!!

It was so sad to see the newsflash about the death of 10 new born babies in a hospital fire in Bhandara, Maharashtra on 9th of Jan, 2021. What is shocking, is that in the last few months there have been over 50 deaths in hospital fire accidents across India. In addition, there have been other hospital fires which fortunately did not result in deaths. In total, I have come across 12 hospital fire incidents since May 2020. Here is a list:

There have been other large hospital fire incidents in the past including at AMRI Kolkatta which killed over 90 people – https://www.outlookindia.com/website/story/from-mumbais-andheri-hospital-to-calcuttas-amri-a-list-of-major-hospital-fire-outbreaks-in-india/321919

Unfortunately, as a nation we do not seem to be learning from these tragedies. There is usually a flurry of media attention post the fire, there is a call for investigations, panels are created and reports are submitted to the government, but post that, nothing happens. These hospital fire incidents are primarily because of the following reasons:

  • Not compliant with fire safety rules & regulations – cases of wrongful ‘No Objection Certificates(NOCs)’ being issued to hospitals, have been well documented.
  • Compliant but not doing enough to take precautions – for example periodic checking of electric connections – short circuits are a leading cause of fires in hospitals
  • Inadequate training to handle fire accidents – regular drills with hospital staff are a must and usually, this is not taken seriously. Also the fire-fighting infrastructure is below capacity in many parts of India

These hospital fire accidents can be prevented to a large extent, if regular fire safety audits are done. In Bengaluru, Beyond Carlton(https://www.beyondcarlton.org/) had been making the case for fire safety audits in hospitals for many years and in 2016, the Karnataka fire department had actually done that – https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/bangalore/Fire-safety-audit-across-all-hospitals-in-the-State/article15624433.ece.  

Last month, the Supreme Court of India, after taking suo motu cognizance of the hospital fire accident in Rajkot, asked the State governments to form committees to undertake fire safety audit of all hospitals  – https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/form-committees-to-undertake-fire-safety-audit-of-all-hospitals-supreme-court-directs-states/uts/articleshow/79791808.cms. I hope that all state governments follow the Karnataka example and take this up seriously.  

It is indeed ironic that a patient comes to a hospital to get treated, but dies because of a fire accident. As we mourn the loss of ten infants, let us come together as a nation and put pressure on our state governments to ensure that all hospitals take fire safety seriously!!