This story is from March 23, 2020

Assam evacuates hospitals to make them solely Covid-19 treatment facility

Assam health department on Monday started evacuating two hospitals to convert them to exclusive Covid-19 facilities as the state put itself on the highest level of preparedness for the worst scenario of an outbreak of novel coronavirus. The state has so far not reported any novel coronavirus positive case.
Assam evacuates hospitals to make them solely Covid-19 treatment facility
Representative image.
GUWAHATI: Assam health department on Monday started evacuating two hospitals to convert them to exclusive Covid-19 facilities as the state put itself on the highest level of preparedness for the worst scenario of an outbreak of novel coronavirus. The state has so far not reported any novel coronavirus positive case.
The department has asked all district authorities to identify hostels of universities and colleges and hotel for keeping mildly affected patients on isolation if required.

Coronavirus India live updates
The department has evacuated the eye hospital at Guwahati Medical College and Hospital and a 200-bed district hospital at Sonapur on the outskirts of Guwahati top and converted them into hospitals for exclusively treatment for Covid-19 disease.
Health minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said, “We have closed the eye hospital at GMCH and the patients there will shift to Srimanta Sankardeva Netralaya. We will be treating for Covid-19 here. The Sonapur district hospital will now solely take care of Covid-19 patients.”
He added that it has decided in principle to convert Mahendra Mohan Choudhury Hospital in the city for treating Covid-19 cases only if required.
Sarma said that district administration is identifying hostels in colleges and universities and hotels as places for forced quarantine or isolation for mildly infected persons. “In case of need we will take over these hostels and hotels,” Sarma said.

He said that elective surgeries in all medical colleges have been suspended and OPD patients are told to go to district hospitals instead of medical colleges. “OPD facility in medical college will be restricted to only emergence patients,” he said.
“So far we have kept ourselves free from Covid-19. Till Monday afternoon we have sent 169 samples for test. We have so far received 148 results all of which are negative and we are waiting for results for 21 samples,” Sarma said.
He said that there 150 ICU beds with ventilators ready in the state for treating Covid-19 patients. “We are getting more ventilators,” he said.
author
About the Author
Prabin Kalita

Prabin Kalita is a journalist at The Times of India and is currently the Chief of Bureau (northeast). He has been reporting in mainstream Indian national media since 2001. He has been a field journalist reporting gamut of issues from India’s northeastern region and major developments in neighbouring countries like Myanmar, China, Bhutan and Bangladesh concerning India and northeastern region. He has been covering insurgency—internal and cross-border, politics, natural calamities, environment etc. He is a post-graduate in Geological Sciences from Gauhati University.

End of Article
FOLLOW US ON SOCIAL MEDIA