PM Modi, Rahul visits to burns ICU unwarranted, says health chief

Thiruvananthapuram: A top health official said that the visits of PM Narendra Modi, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi and other VVIPs to the ICU and wards at the Thiruvananthapuram medical college hospital to meet the injured at the Puttingal temple fire were “unwarranted”.

R Ramesh, Director of Health Services (DHS), told The Indian Express that Modi and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi visited the patients separately on Sunday at a time when seven of eight patients admitted in the ICU were in “the most critical condition, with 60 to 90 per cent burn injuries.”

“I was pushed away when Modi visited. After arguing with security personnel, the Director of Medical Education and I had to return to our rooms… A decision by the VVIPs to visit such a hospital filled with charred bodies and patients with severe burn injuries and amputated limbs was unwarranted,” said Ramesh.

“We have no issues with them visiting victims but after two or three days, not within hours after the accident, which is a period we consider as the ‘golden hours’ to stabilise and save the lives of victims. Moreover, it was not just Modi and Rahul who entered the Burns ICU and wards but their cronies and photographers, too. I opposed this but it was beyond us,” the official said.