Mumbai: Guard who dreamt big for sons loses battle to Covid-19

MUMBAI: For the better part of his life, Vinod Thakre had worked as a security guard and had envisioned a brighter future for his sons. He wanted them to be entrepreneurs and not spend their lives in service like he did. Vinod was close to realising his dream-- his oldest had completed a diploma in engineering and had taken up manufacturing masks and sanitisers for the pandemic. But fate had other plans for him. Vinod, 43, took ill following a series of convulsions, subsequently contracted COVID-19 and died. In quarantine, his family did not even get an opportunity to bid him a final farewell. The family is still groping for answers on how suddenly things spiralled downwards.
Vinod was the sixth generation of Thakres to live in Aarey Colony. He married young and had three sons. Three years ago, he suffered brain haemorrhage. He was on medication thereafter and drastically reduced his working hours. Then on June 4, he had multiple convulsions that left his family worried. “We rushed him to a hospital near FilmCity where he had been treated earlier for his brain ailment. But they turned us away as my father was running a fever. We ran around to check at three more hospitals before he was admitted at one in Malwani,” said Akshay, Vinod’s oldest son. But the experience at the Malwani hospital left the family nshaken. “There were rats in the ICCU and no doctors or nurses around at night. We decided to move him the next day after a CT-scan. He had tested negative for COVID,” said Akshay. At a private hospital at Goregaon, the family was told that Vinod would need dialysis for a kidney disease he was sufferin from. The hospital did not have the equipment and suggested Vinod be taken to KEM Hospital. A COVID test at the Goregaon hospital also came negative.
On June 6, Vinod was admitted to KEM Hospital after a four hour wait for completing hospital formalities. A COVID test conducted at KEM Hospital that day came negative. “My father underwent a few sessions of dialysis and his condition improved. He was walking around and talking to us. But on June 9, we couldnt spot him in his ward. A few hours later, a staffer told us he had been moved to a special ward after testing positive for COVID. We never saw him thereafter. A friendly nurse helped us speak to him on phone. He did not complain of anything when he spoke to us,” Akshay said. Meanwhile, the family was home quarantined.
Early on June 17, Akshay received a phone call from the hospital that some medicines needed to be bought for his father. “I couldnt step out due to the quarantine and asked a cousin to do the job. A day later, we were told he passed away. My mother was unconsolable but there was nothing I could do,” Akshay said. Neighbours claimed the body and cremated Vinod. The death certificate stated the cause as “aspiration pneumonia in a COVID positive case with acute kidney injury.” The hospital is yet to release his medical papers and phone.
KEM Hospital dean Dr Hemant Deshmukh said for patients with comorbidities, viral loads are very heavy. “COVID test results could come negative initially and positive later. The incubation period is anywhere between 7 to 12 days,” said Deshmukh.