That in this day and age people can still die of food poisoning means that our public health system is unable to deal with medical emergencies and that people too are unaware about first aid practices and how to deal with such situations. The Deputy Commissioner, Ri Bhoi said that those who organised the church service at Nongkya village in Ri Bhoi district never sought official permission although there was a gathering of nearly 2000 people at the venue. Perhaps there is no precedence for getting permission from the district administration for church services but perhaps this incident would serve as a lesson for the administration to keep itself on alert in case of any human or medical emergencies. At a gathering of so many people if anything untoward happens and the administration is not informed then it becomes difficult to manage the disaster. Incidentally we are prone to think that disaster only means an earthquake, landslip, cyclonic storms and the like. What happened at Ri Bhoi is a health disaster that claimed 8 lives and perhaps more. That some of the patients had to be brought all the way to Shillong Civil Hospital means that the Nongpoh Civil Hospital could not handle the cases or did not have the wherewithal required or adequate beds to accommodate all patients. To bring patients who are in a critical situation all the way to Shillong means loss of precious time.
These are issues that should not be forgotten after this is all over. Its fair that an enquiry will be conducted into the food poisoning incident to find out the exact cause so that similar fatal incidents are not repeated. Over and above that anyone who organises any large scale gathering has to inform the respective district administrations so that no time is lost in addressing such emergencies should they recur at any time in the future.