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PMC gets Covid-ready, keeps Naidu and Baner hospitals ready
On Tuesday, drills were conducted across government hospitals in India to monitor Covid preparedness in case there is a rise in cases due to the BF.7 variant of Omicron
In order to be prepared for rise in Covid cases, the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) has readied its Naidu Hospital. If there is an increase in the number of patients, the civic-run Baner facility will be used for Covid patients, said health department officials.
On Tuesday, drills were conducted across government hospitals in India to monitor Covid preparedness in case there is a rise in cases due to the BF.7 variant of Omicron. This comes against the backdrop of the world’s biggest surge in Covid-19 cases in China after it abruptly lifted restrictions.
In Pune, the PMC, however did not carry out physical drill, and instead, held the exercise online by merely checking the number of equipment at Naidu and Baner facilities.
Speaking about the preparedness in the city limits, Dr Ashish Bharti, health department chief, PMC said that the first facility to open for patients will be Naidu Hospital.
“There are 50 beds at Naidu Hospital which will be ready if there is a rise in Covid cases. If there are at least 20 patients admitted at Naidu, then we will open the two facilities at Baner.One facility has 300 beds, and the other has 200 beds,” said Dr Bharti.
He added that the ventilators and other equipment are already maintained by the health department.
During the Covid pandemic, COEP jumbo facility had 60 ventilators, Naidu Hospital had 51, Baner jumbo unit had 60, Dalvi Hospital had 16 and 10 at ESI hospitals. Later, PMC closed its jumbo facility and shifted most of equipment to Baner facility, where some of them are lying unused.
Ayush Prasad, Chief Executive officer (CEO) Pune Zilla Parishad said that protocol updation is underway along with drills to monitor the preparedness.
“Health department staff is reviewing stock of cylinders,check the functions of oxygen facilities, beds and medicines and other Covid-related equipments. Also manpower plans include training needs and assessment. Protocol update training for doctors is also in process. We have also organised half-day workshops for the nurses as many have joined after Covid, although majority nurses worked in Covid facilities,” said Prasad.
Dr Pradeep Awate, state surveillance officer said that as per the instructions from the Government of India, an online drill of all secondary and tertiary healthcare facilities in the state was completed on Tuesday as a hospital preparedness exercise on the background of the international scenario of Covid-19.
“To successfully complete this drill, nodal officers at divisional and district levels were appointed. All districts and municipal corporations in the state, in addition to the medical colleges participated in this important drill. A review of available hospital beds, ICU facilities, equipment, oxygen system, medicine stocks, human resource and their training, telemedicine facility was taken for all hospitals across the state. Until 5pm on Tuesday, 1,308 facilities in the state had completed this online drill. At least 610 government hospitals, 628 private hospitals, 28 government medical colleges and 27 private medical colleges completed the drill on Tuesday,” said Dr Awate.
He further added that on the background of international scenario of Covid-19, screening of international passengers arriving at Mumbai, Pune and Nagpur airports have been started from December 24.
“All passengers are being thermally scanned & 2 % random samples are taken for Covid testing. All positive samples are referred for Whole Genome Sequencing (WGS). Out of 44,666 patients tested so far, 703 have undergone RT-PCR test and only two have tested positive for Covid. Out of these two patients, one is from Pune and another is from Goa,” added Dr Awate.
