The second wave of Covid -19 hit the country the hardest. The health system of states such as Bihar almost collapsed, and when it came to rural areas, the health system turned out to be a nightmare. There were no doctors, no nursing staff. In many places, the medicines were only available in black. Oxygen cylinders became a necessity and ambulances were available only at inflated prices.
Only very few hospitals were serving Covid patients, and some of the doctors and hospital staff had fled away. Patients were crying to death and cursing the medical staff. Then came the messiah for the rural people, often called private practitioners or jhola-chhap doctors. They treated the patients at a time when degree holders weren’t able to.
We can find many more stories of these messiahs, but when we came across the Arrah district of Bihar, only Sadar Hospital was serving Covid patients. All the villages associated with Arrah district had Sadar hospital as their Covid ward. The Madanpur village of Arrah had a similar situation where hundreds of people fell sick with the symptoms of Covid-19. The testing system was not available and doctors were on the back foot.
This is when Dr Arvind, commonly known as ‘The Arvind Doctor’, took charge of Madanpur as a Gramin Chikitsak. While talking to us, Dr Arvind threw light on the challenges and problems he faced while treating people. He risked his life to save others as the village lacked necessities like PPE and masks. He says,
“I had the spirit of social service and I served for many years. My family warned me against the system, but I didn’t listen to anybody and continued my service.”
More than 400 people were affected with Covid-like symptoms and it was a challenge to arrange medicines for all of them. He ordered medicines from other places and it was hard to find medicines as the cost were relatively high. There was no way to arrange oxygen cylinders and ambulances, but luckily, no one was in a serious to require an oxygen cylinder.
Dr Arvind also mentioned that since there is no cure for Covid-19, he took the advice from the Director of AIIMS regarding the treatment.
Dr Arvind states that many a time, people recovered and forgot to pay the fees but he never asked for the same as it was a hard time for everyone.
He also shared his daily schedule by saying,
“Earlier, I had fixed timings for work but during the second wave, my schedule changed drastically. I had to stay up almost all night to look after the patients. I was even travelling door-to-door and putting my health at risk to check and give medications to the people as more people were old aged.”
When asked about the change in the behaviour of people towards him after Covid, Dr Arvind said that earlier, people used to treat him like a jhola-chap doctor but Covid turned him into a respectful doctor. Earlier, the villagers used to take him lightly but during Covid, people got to know his real worth.
It feels nice to see a change in people’s opinion about a grameen chikitsak or private practitioner. Dr Arvind is one of the only two doctors available in Madanpur village. It is common to have a smaller number of doctors in states such as Bihar, where the health system is always at stake.
Doctors like Arvind are a boon in villages, especially in Bihar, but the problem is that they are always taken for granted and not given the respect they deserve. Dr Arvind has a plea for the government: they need to arrange more facilities for private practitioners or grameen chikitsak in villages so that they can perform their duties well. People should change their attitude towards them as well.