Consider augmenting medical facilities, instead of a jumbo Covid care centre: Bombay HC

The facility is estimated to come up in Nagpur at a cost of about Rs 78 crore will include 400 beds with ventilators

A week after the Maharashtra government agreed to set up a 1,000-bed Covid-19 care centre in Nagpur, the Bombay high court’s Nagpur bench on Friday asked it and the municipal corporation to instead consider augmenting the existing medical facilities in the city.

The bench said admitting Covid-19 patients to hospitals located in thickly populated residential areas and their movement could lead to the virus spread. (Representational Photo/PTI File)

“After the pandemic, the facility is likely to go waste,” said the bench of justices Ravi Deshpande and Pushpa Ganediwala about the proposed centre at a stadium.

The facility is estimated to come up at a cost of about Rs 78 crore will include 400 beds with ventilators.

The centre was originally proposed by Nagpur Municipal Corporation, which had submitted a proposal in this regard to the government that cleared it on September 16.

The bench came down heavily on the government for keeping the proposal pending.

It said Nagpur has become a Covid-19 care hub as patients were coming to the city also from neighbouring Madhya Pradesh for treatment. The bench called upon the state government to create proper facilities and infrastructure for treatment of Covid-19 patients, but on the city’s outskirts.

The bench said admitting Covid-19 patients to hospitals located in thickly populated residential areas and their movement could lead to the virus spread.

The bench also expressed displeasure over the high cost of treatment at private hospitals. “The medical facilities and services in private hospitals are becoming a costly affair and those who cannot afford or fail to get timely berth in the hospital have to sacrifice the life or succumb to such inadequacies.”

The bench was hearing a bunch of petitions concerning lack of infrastructure for Covid-19 patients in Nagpur.