66 hospitals have caught fire in 2 years in Delhi

Seven newborn babies died in a fire at a child care center in Delhi. Except one child who was 25 days old, all the other children were only 15 days old. There have been many incidents of fire in hospitals in Delhi in the last several years. In the last two years, incidents of fire occurred in a total of 66 hospitals in the capital. According to the data, 30 fire cases were registered in the year 2022 and 36 fire cases were registered last year. In February this year, an incident of fire was reported in Delhi's Lok Nayak Hospital. About 50 people including patients and hospital staff were rescued in this accident. The fire broke out in the emergency ward on the third floor of the hospital. Police and hospital staff had evacuated the patients from the ground floor.

The recent case of fire in a hospital is of Vivek Vihar Care New Born and Child Hospital in Delhi. Where a fire broke out on Saturday night. There were 12 newborn babies admitted in this hospital. 7 children died due to burns in the fire. While the other 5 have been admitted to the hospital. Where they are undergoing treatment. There was no emergency gate in this hospital. People broke the window and took the children out.

Delhi government has ordered a magisterial inquiry into the fire. In an order, Divisional Commissioner Ashwini Kumar directed Shahdara District Magistrate to investigate the incident. Police said that besides the license having expired, the hospital also did not have qualified doctors and no approval was taken from the fire department.

Deputy Commissioner of Police (Shahdara) said, "The license issued by the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) of Delhi Government to 'Baby Care New Born Child Hospital' has already expired on March 31." Even the license issued to the said hospital allows only five beds.

Police said that no fire extinguisher was installed in the hospital to deal with the fire situation and besides, there was no emergency exit in the hospital in case of any untoward incident. Meanwhile, fire department officials said that the hospital had not taken any NOC from the department. 16 fire tenders were deployed to control the fire. The oxygen cylinder kept in the store building exploded, due to which the surrounding buildings were damaged.

The main reason for fires in hospitals is negligence. While constructing many hospitals, even emergency gates are not made. Vivek Vihar Care New Born and Child Hospital also did not have an emergency gate. Also, he did not have NOC. Fire NOC is issued by the fire service. Under this, it is verified whether there is a possibility of any fire related accident in the building or not. Whether he has the equipment received in case of an accident or not.

Along with this, there is so much electrical load in the machines installed in hospitals that it even causes short circuit. Also, electrical safety standards are not followed in many hospitals, which leads to major accidents.

According to an officer of Delhi Fire Service, every hospital should have emergency gates. So that in case of emergency, patients can be evacuated quickly. Fire service personnel have five to six minutes to rescue trapped people. Hence, there is a need for compartmentation. Compartmentation is a building design and construction technique that allows a building to be divided into separate sections.