24 patients, including 12 infants, die in one day at hospital in India’s Maharashtra

Twelve infants have lost their lives in one day at a hospital in the Indian state of Maharashtra, sparking a political storm, with the opposition politicians accusing the regional government and hospital authorities of negligence.

The infants died on Sunday and were among 24 deaths recorded that day at the Shankarrao Chavan Government Hospital in Nanded district, some 600km from India’s financial capital Mumbai, hospital officials and local media said on Tuesday.

The neo-natal unit of the hospital, where the infants were being treated, was reportedly very crowded on Sunday, with four to five babies in one incubator, which was otherwise designed to hold just one.

Opposition politicians accused the Maharashtra government, run by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s party and an ally, of gross negligence over the deaths of the infants.

“The BJP government spends thousands of scores of rupees on its publicity but there is no money for medicines for children?” Rahul Gandhi, leader of the main opposition Congress party, said in a post on social media platform X.

India’s public healthcare system is woefully ill-equipped, plagued by a dearth of staff and equipment. The doctor-to-patient ratio is 0.7 per 1,000, according to the World Health Organization, which recommends a level of 1 per 1,000.