25-year-old Shaheena Begum, a resident of Moghalpura in Hyderabad, was admitted to Hyderabad's Gandhi Hospital on March 31, after she suffered from fever and cough.
Subsequently, test samples for COVID-19 were taken from her. Her test result was supposed to come on April 3. However, officials at the government hospital dedicated for COVID-19 cases, said that her test report was missing and collected samples from her yet again.
The test samples were taken on April 5, but bizarrely enough, the reports went “missing" once again.
A devastated Shaheena was made to undergo the ordeal of cooperating with the medical staff to collect the samples on Friday. But, the laboratories didn’t learn anything from their past negligence, and the test reports went "missing" yet again.
“This is gross negligence by the staff at the hospital. How can test reports go missing thrice?” asked Raheemuddin, Shaheena’s brother.
Raheemuddin is convinced that his sister is not infected with the coronavirus.
“She had a cough and fever, but now she has recovered from it. However, these doctors are not discharging her. Each time they misplace her report and prolong her stay at the hospital. We are worried about her stay in the hospital. They have kept her there for so long. Even if she doesn’t have COVID-19, she might contract it because of her stay in the hospital,” a worried Raheemuddin said.
He also alleged that there are other patients like his sister who are waiting for test results after their reports went "missing".
“There are several such incidents of test reports going missing which I have tweeted and brought to the notice of authorities and the government,” said Amjed Ullah Khan, leader from the Majlis Bachao Tehreek political party.
Her samples were collected again today, How come Covid-19 test reports missing from Gandhi Hospital, what's happening there, please inquire into this./2
— Amjed Ullah Khan MBT (@amjedmbt) April 17, 2020
Commenting on the negligence, Dr Shravan Kumar, Superintendent of Gandhi Hospital, admitted that there are several “gaps” in the process of collecting samples, doing tests at the laboratory and giving the results.
“This is not the failure of the administration but the failure of the testing staff, laboratories and the Microbiology department,” the Superintendent said.