GS-2: Government policies and interventions for development in various sectors and issues arising out of their design and implementation.
GS-3: Disaster Management
Frequent Hospital Fires in India
Context: As many as 93 people, most of them Covid-19 patients, died in 24 incidents of fire in hospitals in India since August 2020.
More than half these fires occurred in March and April, when rising Covid-19 cases snowballed into a second wave.
Why are these fires taking place regularly, despite the hospitals having passed fire checks and audits?
Overstressed ICUs, ACs
Hospitals are increasing beds, equipment and staff to admit more Covid patients, but it has not been possible to immediately expand the electrical wiring system.
The ventilator, equipment, air conditioners are working 24 x 7 now. ideally air conditioners need to run for 15-16 hours and then need a cooling period. This has put a pressure on the entire system
Medical equipment or wires carrying current beyond their capacity can overheat leading to fires.
More inflammable material
In Gujarat, fire officials have noted that ICUs lack cross-ventilation – this is the case with all ICUs as they are sealed for the purpose of keeping them sterile.
In addition, due to Covid, there has been an increase of inflammable material in Hospitals – sanitiser spills and vapour, higher oxygen content in the air, and PPE kits, which are made of synthetic materia
Highly inflammable material such as these spread fire quickly and leave very little time for a response
A high oxygen percentage and sanitiser fumes in the ICU at times led to a flash fire reducing the time to respond.
Way Ahead
Hospitals must install sprinklers. If temperature rise to 78°C, sprinkler automatically starts dispensing 35 litres per minute. They can become first form of response,
To further reduce response time, government should give preliminary training to staff in hospitals,
There is a need to augment deputation of more fire officials in major Covid hospitals
Regular auditing once a week or two is required in densely populated hospitals
