Building unsafe, will fix accountability for collapse: Health min

Jamshedpur: The tragic incident of the collapse of a dilapidated balcony at the state-run Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Medical College and Hospital (MGMMCH) Sakchi has put the govt on its toes.
Soon after the incident in which three patients died and injured two others, health minister Irfan Ansari on Sunday admitted that the building was not safe for health services anymore.
"The entire building (of the medicine block) will be demolished in the next two weeks. The healthcare facilities and the patients from the block will be shifted to an alternative place," Ansari said.
Indirectly admitting that the hospital management was not sincere in identifying and repairing the damaged structure, the minister said the current focus of the MGM hospital management was on shifting all the departments to the newly built hospital campus on the MGM college campus at Dimna in Mango.
"It was an old building but we cannot disown the responsibility, a probe has been ordered to fix accountability. Whoever is found responsible will face action," Ansari said, stressing that the state building construction department, the agency responsible for the upkeep of the hospital building, cannot run away from its responsibility.
The minister further said the lack of sufficient water facility on the new campus in Dimna which has a capacity of 851 beds has been delaying the shifting of the MGM hospital departments from its old campus in Sakchi.
"We have decided to get Tata Steel water connection at the new building and start the hospital in a full-fledged manner. The Sakchi hospital will be shut as the structure is not safe," the minister added.