he six-member committee formed by the Punjab government to ascertain the exact causes of the huge blaze that erupted on the third floor of the Children’s Hospital, Lahore, last week, has still not come up with its initial report.

The incident, even though not new for the public sector establishments in the city, begs the question: how safe are our public hospitals for patients and their attendants?

Hospitals are supposed to be the safest places on earth — they can’t run out of stock on drugs and all kinds of important paraphernalia. Similarly, they can’t not have fire-safety mechanisms in place. That is a big risk not just for the patients but also for the doctors and paramedic staff on duty.

The incident also raises doubts as to the efficacy of the fact-finding committees — in the past, we’ve seen a number of disasters occur in the city where scores of precious lives were lost, aside from the damages incurred to properties; and every time a committee was formed that could produce no concrete findings whatsoever.

Correspondingly, no practical steps have been taken to prevent such incidents from happening in the future. Fire incidents continue to occur. Early this year, the Pace department store caught fire.

In the case of the Children’s Hospital, fire is said to have erupted at a pharmacy on the third floor, which was at a fair distance from the OPD and other wards of the hospital. Mercifully, no casualty was reported. Had the fire started on the first or second floor, or closer to a ward, the consequences would have been devastating. However, according to eyewitnesses, the hospital was full of patients when the fire started.

Another question that arises is with respect to the preparedness and arrangements for a timely and effective response in the event of a fire or any other disaster, both on the part of the hospital administration and the district management. Even the fire-fighting teams of the city district government could not douse the flames before the fire had consumed the whole stock of medicines worth millions of rupees.

Hospitals are supposed to be the safest places on earth — they can’t run out of stock on drugs and all kinds of important paraphernalia. Similarly, they can’t not have fire-safety mechanisms in place. That is a big risk not just for the patients but also for the doctors and paramedic staff on duty.

The incident sent a shockwave among the citizens. The Punjab government set up a six-member committee to probe the fire. The committee would ascertain the causes of the fire, and look at the firefighting system at the hospital. It was directed to submit its report in three days.

nitially, the fire was attributed to short-circuiting. According to the hospital administration, the fire got out of hands due to the presence of highly inflammable materials such as drip sets, syringes and spirit etc.

Sources in Rescue 1122 say that around 20 emergency vehicles and 60 rescuers took part in the firefighting operation. The rescuers had to use SCUBA masks as the floor was engulfed in thick smoke. Rescue teams also used high-rising snorkels to control the fire. They faced difficulty in conducting the operation at such a height in the absence of proper entry points, and had to cut through the front shed to enter the area.

Provincial Minister Khawaja Salman Rafique, the Lahore deputy commissioner, Rescue DG Dr Rizwan Naseer, Additional Secretary (Technical) Dr Hafiz Shahid Latif and Dr M Saleem were among those who visited the hospital to oversee the operation.

Talking to TNS, Prof Muhammad Saleem, the Children’s Hospital medical superintendent, ruled out sabotage. He said, “Such incidents can happen anywhere, anytime.”

He also rejected the notion that there was a dereliction of duty on the part of the hospital administration or staff: “[The hospital staff] responded the minute they came to know about the fire. They started dousing the fire which due to the presence of chemicals and other combustible materials could not be controlled. Soon Rescue 1122 and firefighting teams arrived as well, but by then it had turned into a huge blaze and gutted the entire stock of medicines in the store on the third floor [of the hospital].”

Prof Saleem claimed that the firefighting equipment in the hospital was “in good shape.” Only recently, the concerned government departments had carried out an inspection of the equipment, he added.

According to him, the officials also checked the preparedness of the staff in this regard and had declared the place “up to the mark.”

He also said that though the electricity wiring was “in good condition, due to frequent outages the possibility of short-circuiting cannot be ruled out.”

The writer is a senior journalist. He can be reached at   ahsanzia155@gmail.com