MARGAO
Even as the food provided to the Covid patients at the South Goa district hospital is a subject matter of debate with complaints forthcoming from the patients more often than not, officials manning the hospital say the food offered to patients is hygienic and prepared as per the dietician order.
Senior officials have also ruled out allowing home food for the patients for the simple reason that it will be impractical for the staff to hand over the home food to the hundreds of patients brought in by their family members.
Officials said the hospital provides the patients with lunch, breakfast, evening tea and dinner supplied by the contractor. “In addition, the patients get soup at around 11 am, tea and biscuits at 4 pm and haldi milk at 9 pm. The hospital staff is trying their best to improve on the diet and goes strictly by the advise of the dietician,” informed Hospicio hospital Medical Superintendent, Dr Deepa Correia.
On the refusal to allow home food for the patients, Dr Correia said it is not practical to allow home food for all the 500 patients undergoing treatment in the hospital. “Just imagine the time that will be consumed to take the home food left by the relatives at the entrance to the hospital to each of the wards. We will have to employ dozens of multi-tasking staff just to carry the home food left at the entrance to the patients. Since this entire process is time consuming, one cannot rule out the possibility of food getting stale causing more problems for the patients,” she added.
