Twin fires kill 22 in India

NEW DELHI — At least 22 people have been killed in two separate fires in India, most of them patients who were trapped in the intensive care unit of a major hospital, officials said on Tuesday. More than 40 critically ill patients were in the ICU of a private hospital in the eastern state of Odisha when fire broke out on Monday night, apparently after an electric short circuit. Authorities said 20 people had died in the blaze, mostly from smoke inhalation. More than 100 patients were rescued by firefighters who smashed windows to get them out of the burning building. “Some patients were evacuated by breaking a window on the first floor and then they were lowered to the ground floor. And some of them were evacuated through the adjoining operation theater which was empty at that time,” said Odisha’s health secretary Arti Ahuja. “There are about 106 people who are (now) in different private and government hospitals,” she told the NDTV news channel. Two more people died early on Tuesday morning when a high-rise luxury apartment block in the western city of Mumbai caught fire. Firefighters said 11 people had to be rescued from the blaze and two died of asphyxiation after they became trapped in the stairwell. The cause of the fire was not immediately clear. Such disasters are relatively common in India, partly because of poor safety standards. — AFP