Dr Anand Chatoorgoon says environmental activist Dr Wayne Kublalsingh is in the danger zone and warned that he could slip into a coma and eventually die, if he continues with his hunger strike. The consultant anaesthesiologist said the body can go without food for one to two weeks, but water is critical to survival.
Kublalsingh's condition has deteriorated significantly since he embarked on a hunger strike a week ago, to cause the Government to put on hold the Debe to Mon Desir section of the San Fernando to Point Fortin Highway.
He has sworn to neither eat nor drink until Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar keeps her promise to establish a committee to review the proposed construction. The Oxford-educated Kublalsingh has planted himself outside the Prime Minister's St Clair office, where two ambulances are on standby-one supplied by the Government and the other by his relatives, to take him to hospital in the event his condition worsens.
However, a defiant Kublalsingh has rejected the Government's offer. He told his mother and members of the Highway Re-route Movement (HRM), who are supporting his cause, that if anything happens to him, he does not want to go to any private facility, but should be taken to the Port-of-Spain General Hospital.
As he did on Monday when Health Minister Dr Fuad Khan visited him, Kublalsingh chased away Legal Affairs Minister Prakash Ramadhar, who stopped by for a visit on Tuesday.
Ramadhar, before becoming a minister of government, was part of the movement before it became HRM, and also joined with Kublalsingh and others in their successful bid to stop the construction of the smelter plant at La Brea. Former attorney general Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj and former minister in the NAR administration Lennox Sankersingh also joined Kublalsingh on Tuesday.
Maharaj said it was unconscionable that Persad-Bissessar would not meet with Kublalsingh and bring about a resolution. Speaking from a medical point of view, Chatoorgoon said the human body can go without food for a week or two, but after one week without water, the effects of dehydration would manifest itself on the various organs of the body, but especially the brain.
"He can become obtunded, which means, his conscious level is not what it normally is. He could become unconscious, and eventually slip into a coma. If untreated, he could eventually die," Chatoorgoon said. In his capacity as chairman of the Sathya Sai Baba Centre of San Fernando, Chattergoon also appealed to the Prime Minister to meet with Kublalsingh.
"If she does not move quickly, he could become unconscious, in which case it would make no sense,"?Chatoorgoon said on Tuesday. He expressed the view that the Prime Minister was being misled and misguided by those around her.
