Jammu and Kashmir government has modified admission policy in Covid health facilities by doing away with a requirement of Covid-19 positive report at the time of admission.
Chief Secretary BVR Subrahmanyam who is the chairperson State Executive Committee has issued an order which reads: “In exercise of powers conferred under Section 24 of the Disaster Management Act, 2005, the undersigned, in his capacity as the Chairperson of the State Executive Committee hereby directs that all hospitals, under the Government of Jammu and Kashmir and private hospitals shall ensure requirement of a positive test for Covid-19 virus shall not be mandatory for admission to a Covid health facility.”
“A suspect cases shall be admitted to the suspect ward of Covid care centre (CCC), Dedicated Covid health care (DCHC) or Dedicated Covid hospital (DCH) as the case may be, depending on the medical condition of the persons based on a medical assessment.”
“No patient will be refused services on any count. This includes medications such as oxygen or essential drugs even if the patient belongs to a different city. No patient shall be refused admission on the ground that he/she is not able to produce a valid identity card that does not belong to the city where the hospital is located.”
“Admission to a hospital must be based on need. It should be ensured that beds are not occupied by persons who don’t need hospitalization. Further the discharge should be strictly in accordance with the revised extant discharge policy in vogue presently,” the order reads.
It says that any deviation from this order shall attract penal action under the Disaster Management Act, 2005.