Kerala: 10,000 doctors putting up a fight to save lives

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Three medical college hospitals and a few doctors worked as a team when the first three Covid-19 cases were reported in Kerala during the last week of January. Five months later, the state has readied 29 Covid hospitals, 29 first-line treatment centres and 171 treatment centres.
A strong workforce (doctors) from the health service has been deployed right from checkposts and airports to Covid specialty hospitals with one singular aim: eliminate the disease. “Health service has close to 5,300 doctors and almost everyone is involved in Covid duty one way or another. Also, 1,400-odd doctors were appointed on contract,” said state secretary of Kerala Government Medical Officers Association Dr GS Vijayakrishnan.
Then there are doctors at the government medical college hospitals, who are taking care of the critically-ill patients admitted there. “In medical college hospitals a well-planned three-tier system was implemented well in advance so that non-Covid treatment wasn’t affected. Hence, doctors were put on rotation basis and it resulted in the smooth functioning of MCHs,” said state secretary of Kerala Government Medical College Teachers’ Association Dr Nirmal Bhaskar.
In addition to the duties at the hospital was the emergency that came when cases started increasing in Pathanamthitta during phase-II. Doctors from the Kottayam and Alappuzha medical colleges were rushed to Pathanamthitta to contain the spread. “This will be the first time that government doctors have been put at the forefront, en masse, to fight a pandemic,” said Dr Kavitha Ravi from the medical college hospital in Ernakulam. In all government medical colleges, we have a total strength close to 2,500 doctor, said Dr Mohan Das from Kozhikode medical college hospital.