State readies oxygen, med supplies to handle possible surge

Even as Maharashtra’s Omicron cases have not gone up from 10 in the last three days, the state government has geared up with health infrastructure, including oxygen to counter possible surge

Mumbai Even as Maharashtra’s Omicron cases have not gone up from 10 in the last three days, the state government has geared up with health infrastructure, a buffer stock of critical drugs and liquid medical oxygen.

After a meeting with union health department, the state decided to prepare oxygen supply, medicines. (Bhushan Koyande)

The Union health secretary Rajesh Bhushan reviewed the public health response of the states in the wake of the Omicron variant. Bhushan, according to state health department officials, advised the states to ensure that the health infrastructure is in place and drugs are available in adequate quantity.

A health department official said that the state has nearly 3,50,000 isolation beds for Covid patients at various Covid Care facilities across the state. “There are 4,39,733 isolation beds excluding ICUs, over 93,000 beds for suspected Covid cases, 1,33,898 oxygen beds, and nearly 39,000 ICU beds. We have 15,582 ventilators available with us. We also have an adequate quantity of PPE kits and N95 masks,” he said, requesting anonymity.

A statement from the health ministry said that the states and UTs were advised to review their readiness to provide quality medical care and be ready for any possible surge. “It needs to be ensured that all health facilities at the field-level have functional ventilators, PSA plants, oxygen concentrators etc...the health secretary also urged the states to ensure to maintain adequate buffer stock for the eight critical drugs identified in the clinical treatment of Covid, guidelines for this was shared with the States in July 2021,” the statement from the health ministry said.

The health department official added that chief minister Uddhav Thackeray had already directed district collectors and municipal commissioners to prepare the hospital infrastructure. He also took stock of the availability of hospital beds, liquid medical oxygen, PSA plants, oxygen concentrators, and the available medicines, including Remdesivir, Tocilizumab, Ivermectin, and others.

According to the health department’s data, the state has 366 Pressure Swing Adsorption oxygen plants or PSA plants across the state with a capacity of 379 MT of oxygen. The state also has 265 storage tanks with 3733.6 MT of liquid medical oxygen.

So far, the state has tested 9,945 passengers that arrived at airports in Mumbai, Pune and Nagpur. Of these, 8,846 were from at-risk countries.

Meanwhile, Maharashtra added 789 new Covid infections, taking the tally to 6,641,677. It reported seven fatalities on Thursday, pushing the death toll to 141,211. Mumbai reported 219 new infections, taking its tally to 764,654. The city also recorded one death in the last 24 hours, pushing the death toll to 16,354.