By: AswathyP
More than a dozen Bangladeshi health workers have been arrested on charges of selling thousands of fake COVID-19 negative certificates, officials confirmed on Friday, as the country reels under a surge in coronavirus cases.
The scandal came to light after a Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) raid on Regent Hospital in Dhaka on Monday. The private hospital was one of the health facilities chosen by the government to treat COVID-19 patients.
“The hospital collected more than 10,000 samples and tested only 4,200 of them at different government health facilities. But they issued COVID-19 reports for all,” Lt. Col. Ashik Billah, spokesman of the elite anti-crime unit of the Bangladeshi police, told on Friday.
He said that Regent Hospital authorities prepared fake coronavirus reports at a computer lab next to the hospital building.
“We found the hospital’s registration expired in 2014 and they were running it illegally. Moreover, they were charging at least $45 for a coronavirus test and also charged huge amounts of money for treatment although it was supposed to be free according to an agreement signed with the government in late March,” Billah said.
The Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) on Tuesday suspended all operations of the hospital. Nine people have been arrested but the hospital’s managing director and owner, Mohammad Shahed, remains at large.
“When the country first detected COVID-19 cases in early March, it was an emergency and the government urged private hospitals to step up and treat coronavirus patients. We didn’t get much response at the beginning, (but) Regent authorities approached us and we signed an agreement with them,” Dr. Nasima Sultana, additional director general of DGHS said.
