The residents of north Kashmir’s Kupwara district have only two physiotherapists working in the entire district since past many years despite repeated requests to the health officials to provide adequate medical staff to the district. The district has seven Community Health Centers (CHC) but only two physiotherapists are available to serve the people.According to wire service—Kashmir News Observer (KNO), Machil remains cut-off from the rest of district headquarters throughout winters and deserves best of the medical facilities and staff to cater to the needs of its residents.“Patients with multiple ailments suffer a lot as two physiotherapists have been deputed in the entire district without knowing how to deal with such patients,” alleged a group of residents from Kupwara.The two physiotherapists are posted at SDH Kupwara and DH Handwara.They said that despite having seven CHCs in the district, authorities especially health department has failed to upgrade any of the health centers. “Most of the patients in our area suffer strokes or paralyses and they literally die for the want of medical attention as they can’t be shifted to Srinagar given the closure of roads due to huge snow accumulation,” said the angry residents, demanding that all seven health care centers must be upgraded forthwith keeping in view the demands and the concerns being expressed by the locals of Machil.Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Kupwara Dr Abdul Gani said that locals have raised the issue of upgradation of health centers during the recent back to village (B2V), the issue must be under active consideration of the government. “I will check the status,” he said—(KNO)