Right to life & Denial of Medical Emergency Treatment and its Subsequent Liability*

Abstract

No Indian law, whether it be coded or uncoded, specifically mentions emergency medical care or the liability that goes along with it^[1] What we can only infer from this is that when a doctor refuses to provide a medically essential treatment for irrational reasons, they are not directly liable and cannot be sued. There is no clear-cut basic standard of care that medical practitioners must adhere to in urgent and critical situations; instead, this depends entirely on the doctors' will. This article's main goal is to help readers understand how doctors can be held accountable when a patient is denied emergency care for careless reasons, such as the patient's inability to pay, the doctor's own interests, the need to follow protocol, etc. These reasons stand beyond the realm of medical reasonability and are unenforced by sound justifications like lack of expertise or equipment, or space. These explanations go beyond what is reasonable from a medical standpoint and are not supported by valid arguments like a lack of knowledge, resources, or available space.