The Fortis Memorial Research Institute (FMRI) here on Thursday briefly grappled with a shortage of liquid oxygen after the supply from a plant in Bhiwadi was delayed for several hours. However, the district administration intervened to make alternate arrangement and thwarted a crisis.
In a situation akin to Delhi hospitals over the past few days, FMRI too, was downed to just 45 minutes of liquid oxygen supply, forcing the hospital authorities to put out a series of distress messages on Twitter seeking immediate intervention of the State and Central government.
Tagging Home Minister Amit Shah and Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal among others, the hospital authorities in a tweet said: “Fortis Hospital in #Haryana has only 45 minutes of oxygen left. Requesting @ashokge hlot51@raj nathsingh , @PiyushGoyalOffc , @m lkhattar and @AmitSh ah to act immediately and help us to save patients’ lives [sic]”. Another tweet said it was an “ #SOS call from Fortis to allow oxygen tanker from Bhiwadi to reach our hospital #ASAP .
The district administration intervened to immediately supply around 100 oxygen cylinders to hospital and later ensured that it got its regular supply from the Bhiwadi plant as well.
Regular vendor
Deputy Commissioner Yash Garg told The Hindu that the hospital’s regular vendor in Bhiwadi deserted them leading to the shortage of the liquid oxygen. “We have adequate supply of oxygen for hospitals in Gurugram. We had offered to Fortis as well to take supply from one of our tankers on Wednesday evening. But they refused saying that they would anyway get supply from their vendor on Thursday. But the vendor deserted them leading to short supply,” said Dr. Garg.
He added that the daily average need of Gurugram hospitals was around 25 MT liquid oxygen and was being easily met from Panipat plant. “The Union government has now fixed a quota of 20 MT to Haryana from Bhiwadi plant as well taking the total quota of state to 120 MT,” said Dr. Garg.
“Heartfelt thanks to PMO, central and state government authorities for responding to our SOS. Tanker from Bhiwadi has reached averting a serious crisis,” said a statement from FMRI later in the evening.
Earlier, CM Manohar Lal reviewed the COVID-19 situation in Gurugram and also enquired about the supply of oxygen to the hospitals.
