Doctors head for Barishal from Dhaka to treat launch fire victims

Most of the victims were brought to Barishal Sher-e-Bangla Medical College Hospital after the fire started about 3am on Friday and burnt the Barguna-bound launch MV Abhijan-10 from Dhaka for nearly three hours. 

HM Saiful Islam, director of the hospital, said 70 people burnt in the fire were admitted to the hospital. Out of them, 67 were kept at the surgery unit as the burns unit was closed. Three others were sent to Dhaka in “critical” condition.

Five survivors of two families were taken to the Sheikh Hasina National Institute of Burn and Plastic Surgery in Dhaka. The Rapid Action Battalion said it was airlifting two other critical patients to Dhaka.

The Directorate General of Health Services formed a team of five specialists from the burns and plastic surgery institute in Dhaka and sent them to Barishal, citing the risk of relocating the patients and the lack of a burns unit in the southern district.  

The team of doctors consists assistant professors Nurul Alam and Dr Mashrur Ur Rahman, Registrar Morshed Kamal and resident physicians Mridul Kanti Sarker and Shawon Bin Rahman.

“We’re trying to ensure proper treatment of the victims,” Health Minister Zahid Maleque said while visiting the injured people at the burns institute on Friday evening.

He said 10 burnt victims were being brought to Dhaka and several of them were in critical condition.

The passengers injured in the fire engulfing MV Abhijan-10, a Barguna-bound launch, on the Sugandha river in Jhalakathi are undergoing treatment at Sher-e-Bangla Medical College Hospital in Barishal.

The institute’s Coordinator Dr Samanta Lal Sen said some of the five victims brought in the evening had their respiratory tract burnt.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who is in the Maldives on a state visit, called and checked on the injured, he said.

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Doctors head for Barishal from Dhaka to treat launch fire victims