Prayagraj: The District Women’s Hospital, more commonly known as Dufferin, stands as one of the busiest maternity hospitals in the region — yet today it is grappling with a life-threatening crisis of medical infrastructure.
Despite handling nearly 300 deliveries every month, including a significant inflow of patients from adjoining districts like Kaushambi, this 200-bed hospital does not have a single ventilator for newborns. This glaring gap in critical care facilities is turning what should be a place of hope into a place of despair for countless families.
In cases where newborns struggle with respiratory distress, doctors at Dufferin are left with no choice but to refer them to the Children’s Hospital.
However, arranging a ventilator is no easy feat. Demand far outstrips availability, and in moments when every second counts, delays often prove fatal.
Families are then forced to look toward private hospitals where treatment costs are prohibitively high, leaving many unable to afford lifesaving care. Tragically, such helplessness has cost precious lives.
The death of a newborn from Kaushambi on Wednesday painfully illustrates this crisis. Ruby, the mother, had delivered her baby at Dufferin.
Almost immediately, the child displayed severe breathing difficulties. With no ventilator available, the family was rushed by ambulance to the Children’s Hospital. Yet by the time they arrived, no ventilator could be arranged in time. Despite the family’s desperate struggle, the baby could not be saved and passed away later that evening.
This tragic case is not an isolated incident — it is proof enough that government hospitals, particularly Dufferin, are cryingly in need of ventilators, not only for adult patients but even more critically for fragile newborns. It raises hard questions:
How can a hospital conducting hundreds of deliveries a month not be equipped with even a single neonatal ventilator? Who is responsible when infants die for want of basic equipment?
Health experts argue that this is no longer a matter of routine negligence but a systemic failure that demands urgent redressal.
The authorities concerned must immediately institute an independent inquiry to examine why ventilators are absent, despite the hospital’s heavy workload and crucial role in maternal and child health care.
Furthermore, the government owes the public a clear answer: Are ventilators available at all in Prayagraj’s government hospitals, and if not, why?
Until accountability is fixed and infrastructure is upgraded, more innocent lives remain at stake. Every newborn deserves a fair chance at survival, and no parent should be forced to watch their child slip away simply because a government hospital lacked the basic tools to save them.
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