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10 Jalandhar pvt hospitals join hands to set up 40-bed covid facility
Facility being readied near Nakodar under Punjab chapter of the IMA; pvt hospitals to provide all facilities or free, admn to arrange consumables and medicines, says DC
Chandigarh Ten leading private hospitals from Jalandhar City, facilitated by the Punjab chapter of the Indian Medical Association (IMA), have combined to establish a high-end 40-bed COVID-19 hospital near Nakodar. The facility will have 20 ventilators.
The special facility, to be used after the 350 bed-facility for COVID-19 at the Jalandhar civil hospital and 500 beds at the Punjab Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS), again only for covid-19 patients, are fully occupied, has been set up in a fully-AC building on 5 acre at Billi Chuharmi village on the Shahkot road. A charitable facility, Sant Waryam Singh Dahiya Charitable Hospital, was to start here in May.
Now, doctors from private hospitals will oversee treatment to covid-19 patients here without charging anything.
Jalandhar deputy commissioner Varinder Kumar Sharma, who has visited the building to oversee its readiness, said the hospital was a novel idea that private players in healthcare had floated.
“The IMA offered that, in case of outbreak of the disease, instead of keeping one or two patients in each private hospital, a single covid-19 facility must be created. Each private player has provided at least one ventilator,” the DC added. As of now, the civil hospital and the PIMS combined have 12 ventilators.
The district administration will provide consumable medicines to the set-up, private players will bear the other expenses on the project. KhalsaAid will take care of logistics related to food for patients and attendants.
“The patients to the IMA facility will be shifted after the civil hospital and the PIMS facilities are full,” the DC added.
IMA Punjab president Dr Navjot Dahiya said all facilities available in ICUs of private hospitals were available in the Centre, which will be ready to induct patients in two more days. “Private players are ready to offer their own spaces as well, in case an outbreak happens. We also have the infrastructure to ramp up capacity at this new special covid facility to 60 beds,” he claimed.
Five pvt units to make PPEs
Five private units have cleared the testing phase to deliver personal protective equipment (PPE) kits, N-95 and N-99 masks to support the state government. Punjab industries minister Sunder Sham Arora said that for the manufacturing and supply of Protective Personal Equipment (PPEs) Ludhiana firms Shiva Textiles, Swamy Textiles and Shingora had been approved by the South Indian Textile Research Association (SITRA), Coimbatore, which is the authorised testing agency. The minister added, “JCT Fabrics, Phagwara, and Ever Shine garments, Ludhiana are the other two.” For making N95 and N 99 masks, Surgeine Hosphiarpur and Oxyclear had got the go-ahead with two other Ludhiana-based firms, Gurkirpa Textlies and Navyug Laminates given permission to make the PPE fabric.
