Ventilator not sanjeevini or revitalizer: Health minister

BENGALURU: In another case of a minister showing insensitivity, health minister UT Khader has said a ventilator is no sanjeevini or revitalizer. He was responding to the 18-month-old child's death due to a fall from her second-floor house near JC Road.
Khader said Gagana's death was not only due to shortage of life-saving equipment in hospitals. "Medical ventilators are not like sanjeevani.There is a shortage of ventilators, I admit, but we also need to consider all aspects, including the fall of the child from the second floor," he said.
"We can't say a small child like this - whether mine or the doctors' - will definitely survive after falling from the second floor. We have to see the extent of injury. Every parent demands that their child should be attended to first when they go to hospital. I also would have felt the same," Khader said.
Recently, home minister K J George caused an uproar when he commented on the rape of a BPO employee by two van drivers. "How is it gang rape if two people rape? Shouldn't there be at least three or four people for it to be called gang rape?" he told a TV channel. George later said he had been misquoted.
Khader said he would consult medical education minister Sharan Prakash Patil on the allegation of delay in treatment by medical practitioners and conduct an inquiry.