India COVID crisis: ‘Our mother has two swords over her head’

The family of a woman with COVID who has missed dialysis because hospitals are overrun describes their desperation.

Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh – For six days, 52-year-old Jai Ram Yadav has been struggling desperately to get his wife admitted to hospital. Lakshmi Yadav, 51, has tested positive for COVID but also needs twice-weekly dialysis for kidney failure resulting from severe diabetes. For the past two weeks, she has been unable to receive dialysis – a treatment delivered by a machine that filters and purifies the blood when the kidneys are unable to do the job themselves – because the hospital cannot offer dialysis to people who have COVID. The couple, who are not well-off, were told by the hospital that they must pay 900 rupees ($12) for a COVID test before Lakshmi can receive any more dialysis as she was experiencing mild symptoms, including a cough. Once she tested positive, she was refused care because of the fear that she might contaminate the dialysis machine. “We are in no position to afford treatment at a private hospital,” says Jai Ram. “We have tried all the government hospitals but they have all denied admission and treatment to my wife.”