To bolster health system, city private hospitals to add 2,100 Covid-19 beds

Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia also inspected a few hospitals and Covid Care Centres where beds will be added in the coming days.

The Delhi government on Sunday directed private hospitals and nursing homes that provide Covid patient care in the Capital to reserve at least 80% of their ward and ICU beds for Covid-19 patients. It also directed Delhi government-run Covid-19 hospitals to increase their bed capacities. The state government said the directives will increase the total Covid-19 ward beds by 3,875 and ICU beds by 1,126.

The popular Karol Bagh market wore a deserted look during the weekend curfew on Sunday. (Sanchit Khanna/HT Photo)

Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia also inspected a few hospitals and Covid Care Centres where beds will be added in the coming days.

In the first order on Sunday, the Delhi government noted that all 115 private hospitals and nursing homes catering to Covid patients are running at full capacity. “It has been observed that occupancy of Covid ICU beds and Covid ward beds have almost reached 100% and 90% respectively in the 115 private hospitals providing Covid-19 related treatment. Therefore, to further augment the bed capacity for Covid-19 patients, all nursing homes and private hospitals providing Covid related treatment are directed to reserve at least 80% of their ICU bed capacity and 80% of ward bed capacity for Covid related treatment and display the revised Covid-19 bed capacity (ward and ICU) on the Covid-19 data management portal immediately,” said the order, a copy of which HT has seen.

Currently, as per a series of orders issued earlier this month, there are 14 private hospitals in the city which cumulatively have 3,553 Covid-19 beds. These hospitals were asked to convert themselves into 100% Covid-19 facilities last week but the order was revised to allow increasing the total bed capacity and offer the surplus beds for non-Covid patients. In addition to this, 19 private hospitals have already reserved 80% beds for Covid-19 patients while the remaining 86 facilities were reserving only 60% of their beds for Covid patients.

The order will help add 1,896 ward beds and 211 ICU beds in private hospitals, said a senior government official.

Prominent Covid-19 private hospitals in the city include Max Superspeciality Hospital, Indraprastha Apollo Hospital, BL Kapoor Hospital, Sir Gangaram Hospital, Jaipur Golden Hospital, Fortis Hospital and Primus Superspeciality Hospital.

In the second order, the health department directed the 11 Delhi government-run Covid-19 hospitals – including Lok Nayak Hospital, GTB Hospital, Rajiv Gandhi Superspeciality Hospital and Ambedkar Nagar Hospital – to increase their total ward beds by 1,979 and ICU beds by 915. However, 696 of the additional 915 ICU beds in these hospitals will not be equipped with ventilators, said the order, a copy of which HT has seen.

As on Sunday evening, 14,668 of 17,792 total Covid beds and 4,042 of 4,139 ICU beds were occupied in the capital.

The orders to augment the number of beds were issued soon after Kejriwal expressed concerns over shortage of oxygen supply, ICU beds and ward beds in the Capital, while noting that the city recorded around 25,500 new cases in 24 hours and the positivity rate increased to around 30% from 24% recorded the previous day.

He also said the Delhi government will add more than 6,000 Covid-19 beds with oxygen facilities in the next few days in locations including health facilities at the Yamuna Sports Complex, the Commonwealth Games (CWG) village, the Radhasaomi Satsang Beas campus in Chhatarpur as well as in a few government schools.

Later, he visited the CWG Village, Yamuna Sports complex and a government school in Rouse Avenue. “As many as 1,500 oxygen beds will be functional between tomorrow and the day after in these places,” he said.

Sisodia visited the Satsang campus in Chhatarpur, DRDO’s Covid-19 hospital near Delhi airport, and a few other hospitals. The Chhatarpur centre will have 5,000 oxygen beds, of which 500 will be operational from Tuesday, Sisodia said.