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Health infra ramped up to fight Covid: Karnataka govt
Bengaluru Dr K Sudhakar, Karnataka’s minister for health, family welfare and medical education on Sunday said that the state’s healthcare infrastructure has been ramped up significantly to deal with the Covid-19 pandemic
Bengaluru Dr K Sudhakar, Karnataka’s minister for health, family welfare and medical education on Sunday said that the state’s healthcare infrastructure has been ramped up significantly to deal with the Covid-19 pandemic.
“(The) capacity to test 1,50,000 to 2,00,000 samples per day, availability of 1,015 MT oxygen, availability of more than 22,000 oxygen beds, supply of Remdesivir as per requirement and various other measures initiated by the state government to control the pandemic has invariably ramped up the health infrastructure in the state,” according to a statement from Sudhakar on Sunday.
The statement comes at a time when Karnataka is seeing a sharp spike in fatalities even though the daily caseload appears to have stabilised.
The state recorded a new high in fatality rate at 2.40% and one of its highest single-day death toll as 626 more died, according to the daily bulletin of the state health department.
Karnataka, particularly its capital Bengaluru, has seen a decline in the number of daily caseloads over the last one week. The state reported 25,979 new infections, including 7,494 in Bengaluru. The total number of active cases reduced to 472,986 across Karnataka and 255,842 in Bengaluru. The positivity rate also saw a decline and stood at 20.76%.
Though, Sudhakar maintained that testing has been ramped up from 60,000-70,000 all the way to almost 100,000 per day, experts, however, have attributed the decline in cases to decrease in testing.
A senior official of Karnataka’s health department said that it is doing “targeted testing” which prioritises primary and secondary contacts among others.
Talking about oxygenated beds, the minister said that the total number of such beds have also been ramped up.
“In March 2020 Department of Health and Family Welfare Karnataka had only 1970 oxygenated beds, 444 ICU beds and 610 beds with ventilators. Over the past one year additionally 22,001 oxygenated beds, 1,248 HFNC beds, 701 ICU beds and 1,548 beds with ventilators have been created. These facilities which were earlier restricted to district headquarters have been extended upto taluk and CHC levels,” the minister said.
The statements come amid a growing demand for ICU and oxygenated beds as the surge continues in most parts of rural Karnataka.
He also added that the state now has sufficient medical oxygen supplies. Karnataka had faced an acute shortage of medical oxygen until about a week ago and there have been arrests of people involved in black marketing of cylinders.
Stating that there is no shortage of Remdesivir, Sudhakar said, “In the month of April 2021, purchase order has been given for 2,74,00 vials and (the) received quantity is 1,80,700 vials till date. Again in the month of May 2021, purchase order given for 51,360 vials and received quantity 11,000 vials till date,” he said. He added that a global tender for 5,00,000 vials and tender opened on May 17.
He also said that the state government is working towards a comprehensive plan to ensure vaccination for every citizen by November or December.
The BS Yediyurappa-led government has announced and cancelled vaccination for people in the age groups between 18-44 years at least three times due to critical shortage of vaccines.
