A high-level meeting chaired by Chief Secretary Somesh Kumar to review the COVID-19 situation in the State on Saturday has decided to provide medical oxygen supply infrastructure to another 10,000 beds in the government hospitals taking the number with the facility to 20,000.
Special Secretary to the Chief Minister in-charge of looking into COVID situation P. Rajasekhar Reddy, senior officials Jayesh Ranjan, Sandeep Kumar Sultania, S.A.M. Rizvi, Rahul Bojja, D.S. Lokesh Kumar, Ronald Rose, N. Satyanarayana, M. Raghunandan Rao, Preeti Meena, Sarfaraz Ahmed, K. Ramesh Reddy and others participated in the meeting.
The Chief Secretary requested the Centre to allot 600 tonnes of medical oxygen to the State, to meet the increasing needs of COVID patients, from the present 430 tonnes a day now. He stated that oxygen supply from Odisha was taking place at satisfactory level following the use of IAF planes and railway rakes to transport the medical oxygen.
However, there would be higher need of oxygen as it had been increasing constantly. In last September, the hospital beds with oxygen facility both in the government and private hospitals was only 18,232 but it has gone up to 49,133 now and steps were being taken to increase the number to 60,000, Mr. Somesh Kumar said.
On the care and treatment of the COVID positive persons in home isolation the Health Department officials said about 7.5 lakh COVID medical kits were available now and another 5 lakh kits were being arranged to be supplied to the positive persons at home.
The Chief Secretary stated that it was decided to add another 500 beds in NIMS, 200 in Sarojini Devi Hospital, 50 in Chest Hospital, 200 in Gandhi Hospital and 200 in TIMS on the directions of the Chief Minister. Besides, 100 each beds would be added to hospitals at Golconda, Malakpet and Vanasthalipuram and 50 at Ameerpet.
On the coronavirus vaccination drive, the Chief Secretary said the Centre had allotted only 4.4 lakh doses for May for vaccinating the population in the 18-44 age group against their number of 1.72 crore in the State. Similarly, against the requirement of 30.45 lakh doses of vaccine for giving the second dose to the age group above 45 years the Centre had allotted only 8.35 lakh doses for the first fortnight of May. A call centre with No. 040-21111111 was set up for assistance to the COVID patients in GHMC area, he noted.
