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Almost all ICU beds taken, Ghaziabad refers patients to Delhi
Concerned by the rising number of Covid-19 cases in the district, the Ghaziabad health department is now scouting for more ICU beds and has also started referring
Concerned by the rising number of Covid-19 cases in the district, the Ghaziabad health department is now scouting for more ICU beds and has also started referring critical patients to Delhi in order to avoid fatalities. The district, according to state control room figures for September 17, has a total of 11,831 Covid-19 cases and 3,542 of them were reported since September 1.
Officials said with the rise in number of Covid cases, the occupancy in hospitals has also gone up and almost 80% of ICU beds -- 37 in government hospitals and 98 in private hospitals -- are taken. As a result, officials have now started referring critical patients to Delhi and are also trying to arrange more ICU beds in the city.
“We have about 5% patients who come with severe symptoms and need ICU beds. Since these beds are not easily available, we have started referring critical patients to Delhi. This week, we referred 10 patients to Delhi and if patients are able to find ICU beds at private hospitals in Noida, they will be referred to those hospitals as well. On our part, we are trying to arrange more ICU beds. We have two new private hospitals which have 100 beds each and together, they have 60 ICU beds,” said Dr NK Gupta, chief medical officer, Ghaziabad.
“We are trying to get clearances for the two hospitals as soon as possible, but we estimate that the two will be ready only in another 20-25 days. Until then, we will refer critical patients to Delhi. We do not prefer that our patients go to Meerut as the number of fatalities there is high,” he said.
According to official figures, of the 74 deaths recorded in Ghaziabad, 33 took place in Ghaziabad itself while 37 happened in Meerut, besides two each at Delhi and Noida hospitals.
The officials are also concerned as cases which are coming in these days are showing severe symptoms.
“The severity of symptoms has gone up in cases reported over the past two weeks or so. So, they need L2 or L3 category ( L2 deals with severe and L3 with critical patients) hospitals for treatment. Since fatalities in the higher age group is already high, we are focussing on immediate referral and treatment of aged patients,” Gupta said.
According to the health department, the number of fatalities in the age group of 0-9 years is zero while the highest number of fatalities is in the age group of 60 years and above. They account for 27 deaths or 36.49% of all deaths since March.
The second highest number of deaths is in the age group of 50-59 years which account for 22.97% of all Covid deaths in the district so far. The third highest group is of those aged 40-49 years, which accounts for 21.62% of the total fatalities.
“The age groups of 20-29 years, 30-39 years and 40-49 years have the most number of cases in Ghaziabad. But the fatalities rates in these groups are low. This is because senior citizens tend to have low immunity and several co-morbid conditions that the young often don’t have,” said Dr Rakesh Gupta, nodal officer (Covid), state health department, said.
