BMC forced to move patients due to oxygen shortage

In a first in the Covid-19 pandemic, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) had to move 168 Covid patients admitted to various civic-run hospitals across the suburbs, including Bandra, Jogeshwari and Borivali to jumbo centres on account of a shortage of oxygen.

In a first in the Covid-19 pandemic, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) had to move 168 Covid patients admitted to various civic-run hospitals across the suburbs, including Bandra, Jogeshwari and Borivali to jumbo centres on account of a shortage of oxygen.

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Put together, the 150 Covid-19 hospitals (private and government run) in Mumbai require 235 metric tones (mt) of oxygen. However, Mumbai mayor Kishori Pednekar said the city has been facing a shortage since the past two days, as vendors are reportedly facing a shortage of raw material.

“168 patients were safely shifted from Bhabha Hospital at Bandra, Bhabha Hospital at Kurla, Bhagwati Hospital at Borivali, Shatabdi Hospital at Govandi, M T Agarwal Hospital and Trauma Hospital at Jogeshwari as oxygen supply was affected at these hospitals, to jumbo centres,” the civic body said in a release on Saturday.

Pednekar, who visited many civic hospitals on Saturday to review the oxygen shortage, said that oxygen capsule plants would be started at Shatabdi Hospital and Bhagwati Hospital.

“The production of oxygen was low due to lack of supply of raw materials. I have asked the administration to set up a liquid oxygen plant to have a permanent solution to these issues. Also, the process of starting an oxygen capsule plant at Shatabdi Hospital and Bhagwati Hospital will be starting. We are trying to keep the citizens of Mumbai safe, and the citizens should cooperate with the municipal administration without leaving their homes,” she said.

Medical-grade oxygen is used for the treatment of critical Covid-19 patients and in other cases of respiratory diseases.

The BMC said that while there was no shortage of beds, the problem was one of oxygen supply, and the issue will be resolved in the coming days, Suresh Kakani, additional municipal commissioner BMC said.

“Despite there being issues in oxygen supply today, there is no shortage of beds. The oxygen supply issue will be resolved soon,” Kakani said.

The city started reporting increase number of cases daily since February 10. From over 500 cases daily, the daily figure went up to above 5,000 by March-end to around 8,000 to 10,000 by the first week of April. On Saturday, 8811 new cases were reported in the city, taking the total up to 571018 cases of Covid.

The high daily caseload of the second wave has caused a strain on the city’s health care infrastructure. Of the 20,279 beds in the city, around 80% (16,335) are currently occupied. Seen at a granular level, Intensive Care Unit beds and Oxygen beds are next to fully occupied: the occupancy rate is 98% for ICU beds and 88% for oxygen beds. Officials said that while oxygen beds may be available, several smaller private hospitals in the city did not have adequate supply of oxygen on Saturday.

Meanwhile, the BMC in a statement on Saturday said, “Majority of private centres may not be able to conduct sessions tomorrow [Sunday] or may conduct for only half a day.” Officials said this was due to a shortage of vaccine doses. On Saturday, 50,725 citizens were vaccinated. Until Saturday, over 1.9 million citizens have been vaccinated in Mumbai since January 16. On Saturday too, vaccination at several centres was affected due to shortage of vaccine doses. Several private and government centres were not able to vaccinate citizens as stock fell short.