Thursday evening I get a call from my Emergency department that a 35y old gentleman had a fall from the nearby construction site and has sustained injuries on his head, back, hip and heel. He is moving his legs but has not passed urine since fall. The patients vitals were normal and further investigations like X-rays, CT and MRI revealed that the patient has a L1 burst fracture in his spine indenting the spinal cord with severe myelomalacia at the conus, calcaneum fracture and pelvis fracture. The patient was lucky that inspite of this grievous injury he was able to move his legs but not able to pass urine, was conscious but unaware of his future, was alive but may be dependent partially physically and totally monetary on his family for the next few months till he is able to earn bread again.

Lots of questions comes to my mind when I see these traumatic and accidental young patients-
1. What are the safety rules at construction sites
2. Do we have proper guidelines and gears to be worn by one and all when working at difficult places with different positions
3. Are the rules, guidelines and gears only for a privileged few and the rest are kids of lower parents or their bodies are made up of steel that they don’t get hurt and don’t need them
4. What insurance- life as well as health does he have while doing the critical job putting his life and future on line
5. Who is responsible to support his disability and feed his family
6. Is he happy that he is saved or sad that he has become a baggage
7. Does he even know how bad his condition is or is it minuscule in front of the many he had in his life
8. Does anyone care for him or does he really care for himself

The next day I see the site engineer and the employment manager at my office trying to understand the gravity of the problem and getting a way out to send the patient to his native village in Bihar. They both realised one thing that the person who has become a patient now is a problem to the moral of the working team, worried that who will look after his daily basic doings, who will be around him during his hospital stay. The best way out of this is to give some handsome cash in hand and transfer the patient to his native village along with his family. The medical condition whether improvement or deterioration is not at all important in front of a temporary improvement in the financial condition of the family and the worker who has turned into a baggage. A hand to mouth family will opt for the money and leave the medical condition for God to heal. This is how cheap life is in our country.

The only good thing that I see after the fall of the individual at the construction site for the last two days is that every worker is now wearing a helmet, a fluorescent coat and a harness to save himself from the fall. Fall of a co-worker has instilled some fear in the brethren’s but my only concern is…….how long will they follow rules if there are any………