Incorrect to say no health minister in MP, CM is health minister: Senior official

A senior official in the Madhya Pradesh government Saturday said it is factually incorrect to say that there is no minister of health in the state as the chief minister himself is the health minister.

His assertion assumes significance as Congress MP Vivek Tankha had on Friday termed the state of affairs in Madhya Pradesh appalling and had emphasised for an administrative structure in the state's health department, which is working without a dedicated minister.

Currently, there is no health minister in Madhya Pradesh as Shivraj Singh Chouhan, who took oath as the chief minister on March 23, is yet to have his council of ministers.

"It is factually incorrect to say that I do not have the health minister. I do have a health minister. The chief minister is the health minister as on date. As far as the legality of the issue is concerned it is absolutely clear to me as a government servant that I have a health minister," Additional Chief Secretary (Health), Madhya Pradesh government, Mohammed Suleman said, while interacting with some Delhi-based journalists via video-conferencing.

To a question on a large number of officials of the health department being tested positive for the coronavirus, he said the issue has hurt the image of the department but has not affected its working.

"It has become a very sensitive issue. I must admit that it has hurt our image. It has been a setback as far as our image is concerned but there has been no effect on our functioning," said Suleman, a 1989-batch IAS officer.

He said it is a fact that the infection in the health directorate travelled up.

Of around 200 coronavirus positive cases in Bhopal, a large number involves health department officials.

Giving details of the possible cause of infections, Suleman said people in the health directorate were in charge of different districts of the state and they were travelling to the areas under them.

"The health directorate was functioning in a hyper active mode. They had a control room (to track COVID-19 related matters) and there were 50 people working in that control room. So immediately the virus must have travelled to them. Damage was already done till the time people came to know about it. Total 90 people in the health department including their family members got infected. I am happy to say that all of them are comfortable now. None of them has serious symptoms. None of them is in ICU. Some of them have tested negative," he said.

Suleman rejected the reports in some sections of the media against a senior IAS officer, who was heading the state department and reportedly avoided getting admitted to hospital despite being tested positive for coronavirus.

"Somebody trying to fight an epidemic of this size and working for a long time, no matter what precautions you take, the challenge remains that you might get infected. If you look at the way the Prime Minister of England got infected, their health minister got infected and many other senior politicians got infected. So whatever you do there are chances of people getting affected," he said.

Suleman said the health team was working full time, for 16-18 hours a day, and trying to be active and getting in touch with the people.

"So the chance of them getting infected (was there). In hindsight I could say they could have taken better precautions and all of us could have taken better precautions but the fact remains it happened this way," he said.

On a photo of the officer concerned that went viral on social media, Suleman said the circulated picture is not about the treatment at all.

"That was about (her) sample collection at home and I said that that was our primary task. The guys who are reportedly showing symptoms, we would prefer going to their home to collect the samples. She is in hospital. She is not being treated. She is just there in isolation. That is it. Nothing more.

"Coming to office and working hard is a positive sign. In hindsight one can say that you need to be careful but in the last week of March ask yourself, you and me, how aware were we about the real danger (of the pandemic)," he added.