Once a lifeline for patients, burns unit at Civil Hospital slips into isolation

During the Covid-19 pandemic, the burns unit at the Ludhiana Civil Hospital was temporarily converted into an isolation ward to meet emergency space requirements. But what was meant to be a short-term shift quietly became permanent. In a twist of irony, the burns unit itself has gone into isolation — locked away, stripped of its identity and forgotten by the very system that built it.

Just opposite the newly inaugurated ICU ward, the shuttered burns unit stands as a silent witness to administrative neglect. While Health Minister Balbir Singh inaugurated the hospital’s upgraded critical care facility in May this year, no one spared a glance at sealed doors of the burns ward — once a lifeline for patients with severe injuries across Ludhiana and nearby districts.

The burns unit, once a vit