Doctors claim medical crisis in KChR amid coronavirus

Medical institutions of the Karachay-Cherkessian Republic (KChR) have not enough beds for coronavirus infected patients; due to the shortage of beds in specialized hospitals, patients are hospitalized "through the back door," and medications are in short supply, medics have complained.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that ambulance doctors of Cherkessk, the KChR capital, published a series of videos on the Internet complaining of the massive infection of COVID-19, after which Alexander Bastrykin, the head of the Investigating Committee of the Russian Federation (ICRF), ordered to send Moscow investigators to the KChR.

The KChR's health service proved to be helpless against coronavirus due to the fact that in recent decades practically no attention has been paid to infectious diseases in hospitals, Leyla Batchaeva, head of the infectious ward of the Karachay Central District Hospital, told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.

"There are no infectious wards in several districts; they are only in Karachaevsk, Djegut and Cherkessk – but they are in terrible conditions," she said.

She has added that the available beds in COVID-specialized hospitals are distributed "through the back door," "The COVID hospital, which is located in the territory of the tuberculosis hospital, accepts patients only by agreement, and only rich ones," Ms Batchaeva has stated.

According to her story, due to the fact that the infectious ward in her central district hospital is overcrowded, patients are placed into other wards. "I was ordered not to document the COVID diagnosis in those patients who were treated in my ward," Leyla Batchaeva has concluded, adding that the hospital has problems with oxygen, as well as with other essential medicines.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on June 9, 2020 at 03:27 am MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.