New Delhi:
Two MCD hospitals – Hindu Rao and Swami Dayanand should be declared as fully COVID hospitals and there should be no politics on the matter, said Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Thursday adding that the Delhi government will provide every possible help to the MCD hospitals, including funds. It will lead to an increase of 900 beds for the treatment of patients in national capital, he asserted.
Remark from the CM came during a review meeting convened by him on the situation of Coronavirus in Delhi. Several steps taken by the Delhi government to improve the health infrastructure of Delhi were discussed, along with increasing the bed capacity and several other infrastructural requirements in Delhi.
Kejriwal said that the focus of the Delhi government is towards increasing the bed capacity, which will ensure adequate treatment for the people who require urgent assistance. He said that the government and private hospitals should aim towards taking over more facilities. It was suggested that a time-bound preparation plan should be prepared to monitor the increase and availability of beds.
He said, “I came across a situation recently, where when an asymptomatic patient was turned back from admission to the hospital, the patient created a ruckus. This situation should never happen. We must issue an order to allow directing the patients to our COVID Care Centres (CCCs), to make the patient feel safe and in the care of the doctors. More and more patients should be shifted to these centres to cater to very critical patients in the hospitals.”
Kejriwal said, “Secondly, all the helpline numbers of the hospitals, which are also mentioned on our app, should remain fully functional. The hospitals must be directed to make people available 24×7 for providing assistance through the helpline numbers. Thirdly, all the hospitals must be directed to ensure an adequate flow of information on the real-time availability of beds. This data should be updated every day.”
In the meeting, special focus was laid on the three-tier arrangement of health infrastructure in Delhi, of which first is home isolation, second is Covid Care Centres, and third is an increase in beds and facilities in hospitals in Delhi.
Additionally, the Delhi government has requested the Centre to increase and make 2700 beds from Central government hospitals available for the treatment of Coronavirus patients. Currently, around 15048 beds have been made available as COVID beds, of which more than 5000 beds are empty. The availability of 2700 beds will further increase the COVID bed capacity in Delhi to around 20000.
The issue of dearth of Remdesivir injections in Delhi also came to light during the meeting and it was noted that 18000 injections would be made available in Delhi by April 18. However, realizing the gravity of the situation, Kejriwal directed the officials to prepare an action plan to ensure that there is no dearth and no stocking of injections at any facility in Delhi. Along with this, the current number of ambulances available with the Delhi government is 629, and the current response time is 14 minutes, with no refusals recorded.
The health officials also apprised the CM that all linkages to the hospitals in Delhi, such as banquets and hotels are fully functional to provide services and treatment to Corona infected patients. If the labs where the tests are being conducted are facing issues, the sample size must be reduced to enable them to issue results within 24 hours. And vaccine stock is available for the next 6-7 days.
