2018 photo of Nalanda Medical College Hospital ward is shared as the recent condition of government hospitals in Bihar - FACTLY
Sai Krishna Muthyanolla
July 21, 2020
Photo of a hospital ward with knee-deep rainwater is shared on social media claiming it as the recent condition of a hospital in Patna, Bihar. The text on the image also raises the question ‘Is this how the Bihar government going to deal with the Covid-19 pandemic?’. Let’s verify the claim made in the post.
Recent photo of a government hospital ward in Patna (Bihar), flooded with rainwater.
Fact: The photo shared in the post is from 2018 and is of a hospital ward in Nalanda Medical College Hospital (NMCH), Patna. In 2018, due to the heavy rains, the hospital wards in NMCH were filled with rainwater and sewage. Hence the claim made in the post is MISLEADING.
On reverse image search of the photo shared in the post, a similar photo was found in an article published by ‘Hindustan Times’ on ‘30 July 2018’. In the article, it is mentioned that because of  the continuous heavy rains in Patna, hospital wards including ICUs inside the Nalanda Medical College Hospital (NMCH) were filled with knee-deep rainwater. It is also mentioned that small fishes and insects were visible in that rainwater, creating an unusual sight for the attendants of patients as well as the nurses. The hospital authorities of NMCH claimed that they were helpless as water-logging inside the hospital is an unending problem during the monsoon season. Articles with a similar context showing the same photo were found in ‘India Times’ news website and in ‘NewsBytes’ news portal.
In 2019, similar water-logging incident took place in the Nalanda Medical college Hospital. Article and video footage related to that incident could be seen here and here.
To sum it up, an old photo is being shared as the recent condition of a government hospital in Bihar.
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