<div>In the past decade, over one million people have been killed in road crashes in India. Every four minutes, one person dies in a road accident somewhere in the country. While there are various reasons why road crashes occur in the first place, what is truly alarming is the number of deaths that occur due to delay in medical care. <br /><br />The Law Commission of India in its 201st report, ‘Emergency Medical Care to Victims of Accidents and During Emergency Medical Conditions and Women Under Labour’, notes that “50 per cent of the fatality can be averted if victims are admitted to a hospital within the first one hour”. This translates to 70,000 lives which can be saved every year with timely medical care. Ambi, the driver, could have been saved from medical complications if all stakeholders and the bystanders had brought him immediate help.<br /><br />While there is an urgent need for providing immediate formal medical care to victims — pre-hospital trauma care — the World Health Organisation (WHO) in its report titled ‘Pre-Hospital Trauma Care Systems’ has confirmed that “Even the most sophisticated and well equipped pre-hospital trauma care (ambulance) system can do little if bystanders fail to recognise the seriousness of a situation, call for help and provide basic care until help arrives”. This is particularly important in remote rural areas. <br /><br />The WHO report also states, “Bystanders are often present when an injury occurs, or they quickly reach the scene, (as also seen in the case of Sabari and Raghav). The first few minutes after a serious injury occurs represent a window of time during which potentially life-saving measures can be initiated, such as assisted breathing, applying direct pressure to a wound to reduce external bleeding, and opening an obstructed airway (recall Sabari was suffocating). The likelihood that an injured individual will live or die depends on the timeliness of these actions.” <br />The chances of survival are highest if bystanders provide prompt assistance to the victim. <br /><br />In India, however, most bystanders remain indifferent, often not even alerting the police or emergency medical services (where present), due to fear of police harassment and prolonged legal formalities, as characters in the case have also been saying. <br /><br />A national study commissioned by SaveLIFE Foundation in 2013 to document the impediments to “bystander care” in India reported that 3 out of 4 people in India are hesitant to come forward to help injured persons on the road and the hesitation in 88 per cent of them is driven by fear of legal harassment, including intimidation, by hospitals. <br />Consequently, incidents of inaction of bystanders, delays by police and emergency services or refusal by hospitals are often encountered in newspapers, highlighting not only the inadequacies of the existing formal systems and bystander reluctance or inhibition to help the victims.<br /><br />The aforementioned report by the Law Commission of India clearly notes, “As of now, in India, there is no proper legal framework to encourage citizens to report and come out to give help to the accident victims without fear of harassment.” The report by WHO also supports this view. It goes on to emphasise, “Bystanders must feel both empowered to act, and confident that they will not suffer adverse consequences, such as legal liability, as a result of aiding someone who has been injured.”<br /><br />Across the developed world, where emergency medical services are prompt and effective, governments have recognised the benefit of “bystander care” for injured victims and enacted the Good Samaritan law to protect such bystanders from legal troubles. <br /><br />In India, where emergency medical services are still very nascent, a Good Samaritan law is even more urgently required to protect and encourage bystanders to take proactive measures so that victims do not die waiting for help. Such a law must also hold all official agencies from police to hospitals accountable for the eventual fate of victim. <br /><br />Preservation of life is paramount and no legalities and procedures should come in the way of saving lives that can be saved. India needs a Good Samaritan law to reassure and protect supportive bystanders from meaningless consequences. <br /><br />The writer is the Founder and President of SaveLIFE Foundation, a non-profit organisation committed to improve road safety and emergency medical care across India<br /><br />(This story was published in BW | Businessworld Issue Dated 08-09-2014)</div>
