Sixty junior doctors from RG Kar Medical College and Hospital held three medical camps in the flood-affected areas of East Midnapore and Howrah on Sunday.

A team of 40 junior medics went to Panskura in East Midnapore, where they split into two groups. One of the groups set up a camp at a primary school while another group set another camp at a club in Gorpurosottampur.

The rest of the doctors held a camp at Howrah’s Udaynarayanpur. The camps continued for more than five hours.

“We examined more than 800 patients at the two camps at Panskura. About 350 patients visited the camp in Udaynarayanpur,” said Aniket Mahato, a postgraduate trainee at RG Kar.

“The most common complaints were skin infections like eczema and taeniasis. Some came with fever and cold and cough. A few people, who are on regular medication for diabetes and hypertension, also visited the camps. They have not been able to collect the latest cycle of medicines because the primary healthcentres were flooded,” said Mahato.

Some of them came with prescriptions and the junior doctors handed them the medicines. Few others were asked to bring the prescriptions.

The junior doctors’ team carried with them several medicines, including drugs for diabetes and hypertension.

Chief minister Mamata Banerjee spoke about a spurt in water-borne diseases in the flood-hit areas of Bengal while visiting Udaynarayanpur on Thursday.

She had then appealed to the good sense of junior doctors to end the cease-work. Mamata said she feared a spurt in fever and diarrhoea once the water receded.

“We taught them how to purify water using chemicals. The scarcity of clean drinking water will turn out to be a huge problem in the coming days,” said a junior doctor.

On Friday, 26 junior doctors from RG Kar and Bankura Sammilani Medical College went to East Midnapore’s Panskura to distribute relief material and essential medicines.

The team stopped at three places: Joykrishnapur, Garh Purushottampur and
Pratappur.