'It's Our Duty': Doctors Brave AIIMS Blaze to Help 30-year-old Deliver Baby Girl

New Delhi: As a major fire broke out at the teaching block of the All India Institute of Medical Science (AIIMS) on Saturday evening, doctors at the institute successfully helped a woman to deliver a baby girl amid chaos.

The 30-year-old mother, who was admitted in the gynaecology ward on Saturday morning, was shifted to the operation theatre at Dr Rajendra Prasad Centre for Ophthalmic Sciences of the institute while the patients were evacuated from the ward.

The woman gave birth to a healthy baby girl at around 9:30 pm while the security forces were still dousing the flames.

A senior doctor who helped to deliver the baby said attending to the patient is their duty and they cannot ignore it under any situation and the life of this patient and her child was more important than anything, The Indian Express reported. “We immediately took her to the RP centre operation theatre for delivery,” he said adding the mother and child are both doing well.

As AIIMS witnessed the biggest fire in its history, the department of lab medicine worked on full strength at a makeshift arrangement in the blood bank and didn’t let the patient services suffer.

A baby girl born in AIIMS on Saturday.

Meanwhile, the emergency lab was temporarily shut due to precautionary measures as the fire broke near the lab area which has lots of expensive equipment.

The fire started at around 5 pm from the Microbiology department of AIIMS on Saturday and thick plumes of smoke billowed from the building, triggering panic among the patients, attendants and staff, and affecting the emergency services.

Former Union finance minister Arun Jaitley is admitted at the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of the cardio-neuro centre of the hospital, which is housed in a different building in the complex. Several prominent leaders have been visiting the hospital for the past few days to inquire about his health.

At least 34 fire tenders were rushed to the spot as the blaze spread to five floors. Fire-fighters were struggling to completely douse it even after five hours.