RIMS Adilabad fire: 3 newborns dead, 2 critical
two others died later on Tuesday while undergoing treatment at the Government General Hospital (GGH) in Nizamabad and RIMS, respectively, in the early hours of Tuesday While one of the newborns died within an hour of the incident.
We managed to contain the fire by 3am,” said D Jayatram, station fire officer (SFO), Adilabad. “The fire resulted in the entire ward quickly filling up with smoke as the plastic from the AC burnt.
The fire broke out around 11.40 pm while the 27 newborns and their attendants were present inside the unit, according to preliminary probe. Based on the initial probe, the Adilabad police booked a case of unnatural or suspicious death under Section 194 of the BNSS and started an investigation. Dr Sadhana said that while 23 children were in the SNCU, four others were in a nearby ward. Around Rs 5 crore had been spent on works at the hospital, while Rs 1 crore was sanctioned for AC-related works.
Hyderabad: Three infants, including a two-day and a five-day-old baby, died after a fire broke out due to a suspected short circuit in the air-conditioning unit at the Special Newborn Care Unit (SNCU) of Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS) in Adilabad late Monday night.
Two other infants who sustained injuries are also in a critical condition, hospital authorities said. “As they were preterm babies, they were already in a weak condition and a few of them lost consciousness immediately due to smoke or toxic-fume inhalation,” she added. Health officials said there was a problem with the AC, which was repaired about a week ago. A meeting was scheduled later this month to discuss replacing the existing ACs with new ones,” an official said.
Though the exact cause is yet to be established, it is suspected that an electrical short circuit in a window AC triggered the fire. “Fire and electrical safety audits had also been conducted at the hospital.