RAWALPINDI: A fire in the physiotherapy department of District Headquarters (DHQ) Hospital reduced furniture to ashes and damaged machines on Friday.

Rescue 1122 arrived at the spot within three to five minutes after being informed and extinguished the fire.Farooq Butt, a spokesman for Rescue 1122, told Dawn that some machines in the department were damaged while furniture gutted in the fire. He said no patient and staff were present in the ward when the Rescue 1122 team reached there. He said the flames were put out within few minutes. He said short circuit was the main reason behind the fire.

But Additional Medical Superintendent Irfan Khilji told Dawn that details about the fire would be known after an inquiry. He said an inquiry team would be constituted on Saturday (today).

It may be noted that all the three government hospitals in the city do not have firefighting equipment. “There is no proper system to extinguish fire at the DHQ Hospital, Benazir Bhutto Hospital and Holy Family Hospital,” said an official of the Rawalpindi Medical University (RMU).

He said the hospitals did not have exit routes to evacuate people in case of a fire and the buildings were not properly constructed to save machinery in case of such an incident.He said the government had asked the hospital administration to install fire safety system and released millions of rupees but the system had not yet been put in place.

District Officer Civil Defence Talib Hussain said the hospitals had installed fire extinguisher cylinders but its staff did not have the expertise to use them.

He said the hospital staff should be trained in dealing with a fire emergency.

“Under the law, hospitals’ electric engineers have to submit their testing report of electricity wiring and machinery to Civil Defence Department after every six months. But the three government hospitals have not submitted such report for many years,” he said.

He said the Civil Defence Department had issued a standard operating procedure (SOP) for the public hospitals and other places to deal with any fire emergency.

“Instead of fire extinguisher cylinder, the hospital buildings should have smoke detectors, hydrant system and smoke alert bells,” he said, adding the hospital staff should also be trained to save patients, themselves and the equipment. He said the hospital buildings must have exit routes so people could get out in case of a fire emergency.

He said the Civil Defence Department had launched a survey in the city and found that there was no fire safety system in high-rise buildings, public places and even in hospitals.

Published in Dawn, February 8th, 2020