We met this really unfortunate incident on the evening of 2nd December, 2017. My 6 years old brother caught fire and burned his legs and most of his body. He was crying in pain when we put him in the car and set out to take him to the hospital so he could get medical help. It saddens me to say that in a big city like “Lahore’’ there isn’t a single functioning burn unit. This incident happened around 8:00 PM. And we kept searching for hospitals, actually begging doctors to admit him until 3:00 AM. Unfortunately, there wasn’t a single hospital which agreed to admit him.
A family friend recommended us to take him to Jinnah hospital which has a fully functioned burn unit so we drove him there. After completing all the silly formalities with a half burnt kid in the wheelchair we headed towards the emergency ward (in deplorable conditions) only to find out later that they don’t admit kids under 9. After wasting our time, we went to Children’s hospital where they refused to admit him as they didn’t have a burn unit either. We searched a number of private hospitals but no luck finding a burn unit. Finally, we found a surgeon and admitted him to a private hospital which wasn’t actually for burnt patients but what other choice did we have?
All this made me question the priorities of the Punjab Government and interests of management of these public sector healthcare centers. We have learned it the hard way that there isn’t a single burn unit which is functioning properly. Despite the fact that a number of patients need these facilities our government completely fails to provide it. Only Mayo Hospital has a burn unit with a few beds, limited resources and inadequate staff but there are no plans for the extension of the ward.
It has been the worst experience of our lives. Like the incident itself was not painful enough that we had to go through the helplessness of not providing the care and help that my brother needed. With a very heavy heart, I would like to request everyone to voice their opinion on this so the government does something about this critical matter. I hope no one has to go through what my family had to suffer and I can only imagine what other burned victims went through.
By : Mahrukh Hashmi
