Hasnat Zaman Saikat, Meherpur
Imadul Islam (60) of Kola village in Meherpur Sadar has been working as a gravedigger from an early age. Recently, he has been passing quite busy days with burying bodies everyday, as the death toll in the village has increased to a large number.
Such a situation emerged out of rumours that critically ill patients are deliberately killed using strong drugs, high costs of treatment in public hospitals and non-existence of coronavirus.
On such excuses many villagers treat corona patients at home, even if he or she is critically sick and need ventilation, oxygen support and medicines to treat them. As a result, it is believed that more people are dying from their illeness.
Imadul Islam said, “I have been digging graves since I was 14. Before that, one or two people would die in a month. However, since last few months, people are dying almost every day in our village. Often I have buried more than one body a day.”
Islam described the situation, ‘very grave’ and fears even worse situation of Covid-19 deaths in the coming days.
In the last 21 days, 24 people have died in Kola village having corona symptoms. Most of the houses in the village have patients with Covid-19 symptoms. Kola village is now like a mortuary with new people being added to the list of corpses every day.
Most of the deceased did not go to the local hospital. So, these deaths are not officially recorded or come to the notice of the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS). However, a few seek last minute treatment in hospitals which often turns out to be too late.
Victims’ relatives said that those critically ill patients having corona symptoms are being treated at home as most of the hospital beds are already occupied or there is too little that the doctors there can do to help.
However, even after all this, no patient is willing to go for a Covid-19 test or be hospitalized. Bangladesh Post tried to find out why they have are reluctant to seek treatment in hospitals.
Relatives of the victims say they did not go to the hospital because of possible transmission. Some of the relatives said that doctors end life of the critically ill people by injecting drugs in hospitals. Therefore, they themselves did not even undergo for a Covid-19 test.
In addition, rumours have spread in rural areas that it cost Tk 20,000-25,000 for a Covid-19 test. So, many are not conducting tests out of financial crisis. For this reason, the person with symptoms and the family members of the deceased are left aside.
In the midst of so many rumours, some people believe that the Covid-19 disease itself is a rumour. They are not following the health guidelines, which increases the contagion risk.
Isharuddin from Kola village said, "There is no such thing as corona. Fever, cold and sore throat are old human diseases. No one is dying of corona. One dies of typhoid fever and he is named dead from the Coronavirus."
There are also rumours in the village about the vaccine. Many people say that people die when they get vaccinated, people become monkeys, vaccines are just water and so on.
The scenario is almost the same in different villages of Meherpur. The death toll from the symptoms has reached to alarming proportions. Even if a few deaths come to the knowledge of DGHS, most remain unknown.
Although people are reluctant to go to hospitals and take a Covid-19 test due to various rumours, there is no awareness activity of Meherpur Health Department and District Administration in the villages. As a result, Corona outbreak and casualty in rural areas could become more serious, experts fear.
