Madurai: Family made to sign Rs 1.5 lakh bond for Covid patient's body

Madurai: Family made to sign Rs 1.5 lakh bond for Covid patient's body

The relative said, “When we admitted him, they demanded us to pay Rs 2 lakh as a deposit amount to treat him. However, we were able to pay only Rs 90,000 initially.

Published: 06th May 2021 04:52 AM 

By Express News Service

MADURAI: Private hospitals fleecing patients during a pandemic is the curse of profiteering. One such hospital operating in the Pudur region of Madurai has allegedly made members of a family sign on a Rs 100 bond paper, with a promise to remit the pending dues in a month’s time, before handing over the body of their kin, who died of Covid-19, here on Wednesday. The hospital has also reportedly charged exorbitant fees to treat coronavirus patients.

After a three-member family, including the husband, the wife and their daughter, tested positive for the virus two weeks ago, they have been undergoing treatment in a private hospital in Pudur. A relative, speaking on anonymity, said the wife and daughter were admitted for two days at the hospital and they were charged around Rs 4.5 lakh in total. The amount was paid at the time of their discharge. While the husband was said to be in a serious condition, he was undergoing treatment for 14 days.

The relative said, “When we admitted him, they demanded us to pay Rs 2 lakh as a deposit amount to treat him. However, we were able to pay only Rs 90,000 initially. At the end of Day 14, he was declared dead. The bill amount was given as Rs 7 lakh for him alone, for those 14 days of treatment.

The hospital authorities denied us his body saying the dues were pending. He was the breadwinner of the family and neither did we have so much money. We requested them and brought down the bill to Rs 3.5 lakh. We paid Rs 2 lakh and signed a bond promising to remit the remaining Rs 1.5 lakh in a month’s time.” he said.

All bills would be verified and appropriate action taken: Collector

However, denying the allegations, hospital authorities, on condition of anonymity, said, “As there is a demand for oxygen supply in Madurai, we have to bring it in from other districts, for which, we pay double the amount. We are risking our lives to treat each and every patient. For the past 14 days none of the relatives of the deceased Covid patient came to the hospital. It was our staff, who took care of him completely. When asked for the fee, they took offence and started using foul language.”

Commenting on the incident, District Collector T Anbalagan said that an enquiry was underway. Answering to a question if the government has a mechanism to monitor the fees collected by private hospitals, he said, “Each patient’s condition may differ depending on the comorbid conditions. If they are being treated for such conditions, they would require certain medicines which might be of higher cost. It is inevitable.

However, in the said incident, all the bills would be verified along with patients’ chart and an appropriate action would be taken if the hospital is found to have charged an exorbitant fee.” The Tamil Nadu government on June 5, 2020 issued orders to cap the charges for Covid-19 treatment in private hospitals.

It may be recalled that Spain nationalised all of its hospitals when the coronavirus set in during the start of 2020, to provide equal preference and treatment to every citizen.

KK Shylaja the globally-acknowledged Health Minister from the neighbouring State of Kerala, recently in an interview, stated that, “If we are in power at the Centre, we would nationalise the healthcare system.” Because, that can be the only way forward to indiscriminately save human lives to prevent profiteering and prioritisation of haves over have nots.