As cases fall, Delhi govt orders 115 hospitals to scale down Covid beds

“The occupancy of Covid-19 beds has gone down and has reached a comfortable level. With over 85% of the beds vacant, the government has decided to convert the GTB and Lok Nayak hospitals that were completely Covid be made partially Covid. All other services will be restarted soon,” Delhi health minister Satyendar Jain said on Thursday.

The number of beds reserved for the treatment of coronavirus disease (Covid-19) patients in the city may drop by 14,000 beds as the Delhi government ordered 108 private hospitals and seven of the hospitals run by it to de-escalate the number of Covid-19 beds in view of fewer cases being reported.

Beds are seen at Sardar Patel Covid Care Center and Hospital, in New Delhi. (ANI)

Delhi has, as on Thursday evening, reported fewer than 1,000 cases for seven days in a row.

At present, only 11% of more than 18,700 beds earmarked for the treatment of the viral infection across the city were occupied. Just 19% of the 5,048 intensive care unit (ICU) beds — both with and without ventilators — were occupied as on Thursday evening, according to the state government’s Delhi Corona app.

“The occupancy of Covid-19 beds has gone down and has reached a comfortable level. With over 85% of the beds vacant, the government has decided to convert the GTB and Lok Nayak hospitals that were completely Covid be made partially Covid. All other services will be restarted soon,” Delhi health minister Satyendar Jain said on Thursday.

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The Delhi government on Thursday decided to reduce 2,140 beds earmarked for the treatment of patients with Covid-19 across seven of its hospitals, including Lok Nayak and Guru Teg Bahadur hospitals, both of which will now start treating non-Covid patients as well. As for private hospitals, five that were completely converted into Covid-19 facilities have been asked to retain all the beds, whereas 108 others were directed to de-escalate them.

Currently, the 108 hospitals account for 15,096 of all Covid-19 beds available in the city. Of these, hospitals were asked to keep a minimum of 3,077 beds. Additionally, 32 hospitals that had 1,080 beds were asked to reserve Covid-19 beds as per their discretion.

PRIVATE HOSPITALS FOR THOSE WITH NEW VARIANT

The Delhi government on Thursday also ordered four private hospitals in the city were ordered to create a special isolation ward for international travellers who might have the mutant variant of the Sars-CoV -2 virus first spotted in the United Kingdom. The hospitals include Max Smart Superspeciality hospital-Saket, Batra hospital, Fortis Superspeciality hospital-Vasant Kunj, and Sir Ganga Ram City hospital.

“In order to create institutional isolation facility in private sector for international passengers who have travelled from or transited through United Kingdom in the past four weeks (November 25 to December 24, 2020) and tested positive, the authorities of the following hospitals are directed to establish separate isolation unit for such passengers on payment basis with immediate effect,” read the notice by Dr RN Das, the medical superintendent of the nursing homes in Delhi.

So far, beds had been designated in Lok Nayak hospital to isolate Covid-positive persons likely to be carrying the new variant of the virus. The hospital so far has 39 such persons admitted to its special isolation ward.

“Consequent upon reduction in reporting of Covid-19 cases in Delhi, the competent authority has decided to de-escalate the number of dedicated beds reserved for Covid in the following hospitals,” read an order by the special secretary (health) SM Ali.

Both Lok Nayak and Guru Teg Bahadur hospitals will reduce their Covid-19 beds by nearly 1,000, which is the highest among the seven hospitals, as per the order. Following them will be the Rajiv Gandhi Super speciality hospital in Tahirpur that will reduce the number of beds by 150, the extra ones that were added for Covid-19 patients during the third surge in the number of cases in November.

“We will take a couple of days to rearrange the facilities. We have 121 Covid-19 patients at the moment. All of them will be moved to a single block, and the other services will be started in other buildings and a plan will be made to reduce contact between the patients and the staff working in the two areas,” said Dr Suresh Kumar, medical director, Lok Nayak hospital.

Another senior doctor from the hospital said Lok Nayak will likely restart outpatient clinics January 4 onwards and admissions of patients from among them will start in the rest of the 1,000 beds at the hospital.

“This is a step in the right direction. However, there is still significant challenge for the surgery students – all anaesthesia residents are involved in the care of the Covid-19 patients and no surgeries can take place without them. Also, we have requested the administration to start the college for the undergraduate students,” Dr Keshave Singh, president of the resident doctors association of the hospital.