Radda centre slowly gets back on its feet

A few chairs and tables have been placed inside a damaged room. In one room, children are being vaccinated, while women receive health consultations in another. Inside the main building, workers are busy renovating, painting walls and installing new doors and windows.

This was the scene at Radda MCH-FP Centre in Mirpur-1 yesterday as the facility continued limited healthcare services while trying to recover from last month’s attack.

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Renovation work was in full swing inside the centre. The front and rear balconies, whose walls were demolished during the attack, have been rebuilt with brickwork and plaster and are now being painted.

Radda officials said structural repairs were progressing quickly, but restoring the facility to its previous condition would require replacing medical equipment and supplies and restoring treatment rooms.

Nasrin Akhter, executive director of Radda MCH-FP Centre, said the initial renovation work would continue through this week and efforts were underway to expand services as quickly as possible.

The renovation is being financed by Youth and Sports State Minister Aminul Haque, who visited the centre last Sunday and said he would arrange for its repair and renovation.

Around 50 people received services yesterday, most of them children who came for vaccination. The rest were women seeking healthcare.

Before the attack, around 400 people received services at the centre every day, including over 100 children vaccinated daily.

That changed after the centre was attacked, vandalised and looted at midnight on September 24.

More than 200 masked people armed with locally made weapons entered the facility, held security guards hostage and looted medicines, vaccines, medical equipment and other valuables before using heavy machinery to demolish parts of the buildings. A signboard of “Shommona Dokandar Samabay Samity Limited” was later put up at the centre.

So far, 19 people have been arrested in connection with the incident, said Shah Ali Police Station OC Mohammad Rajib.

Vaccination and some basic healthcare services for women resumed the following day, but the centre remains unable to provide its full range of services.

Mohammad Aziz, a Mirpur resident, brought his 21-month-old son to the centre for vaccination. He said his wife had received medical consultations, tests and treatment at Radda before their son’s birth and that all of their child’s vaccinations had also been administered there.

“Many people like us receive affordable healthcare and vaccinations here. We want the authorities to restore everything,” he said.

Farzana Akhter, who received antenatal care at Radda and brought her daughter for vaccination, said, “If the centre remains closed, many people like us will be in trouble.”

Nasrin said two ultrasonography machines and their colour printers, computers, laptops, refrigerators, a generator and three large air conditioners were looted.

Family-planning supplies, special patient beds, diagnostic equipment and an autoclave machine were also damaged or looted. Furniture, doctors’ tables and chairs, file cabinets, steel cupboards and medicine storage units were either looted or damaged.

She said it was still unclear how much equipment had been recovered or whether the recovered items remained usable.

The centre is preparing a list of required equipment. Once the recovered items are assessed, officials will determine what needs to be replaced.