This story is from May 5, 2021

Chamarajanagar deaths: Hospital was running on buffer stock

There were enough red flags that oxygen supply was running low at the state-run Covid hospital in Chamarajanagar, but it appears the Mysuru district administration was tardy in responding to SOS calls, resulting in the deaths of 23 Covid-19 patients on Sunday night.
Chamarajanagar deaths: Hospital was running on buffer stock
ANI photo used for representational purpose only
MYSURU: There were enough red flags that oxygen supply was running low at the state-run Covid hospital in Chamarajanagar, but it appears the Mysuru district administration was tardy in responding to SOS calls, resulting in the deaths of 23 Covid-19 patients on Sunday night.
Some 12 hours before the tragedy struck, a private hospital in Chamarajanagar town ran out of oxygen and sent 10 patients it was treating to the Covid hospital early on Sunday morning.

Authorities at the Covid hospital say they were forced to dip into their buffer stock at its 6,000 kilo litre oxygen facility since 150 patients were undergoing treatment, 24 of whom were on ventilators and 53 in ICU beds. By the afternoon, the buffer stock was beginning to run dry and efforts were on to replenish it.
Staff say they received 66 cylinders from Mysuru at 1.30pm and another 65 cylinders at 6pm. But that wasn’t enough. Chamarajanagar deputy commissioner MR Ravi on Tuesday said they needed another 100 cylinders, which did not come from Mysuru on time. On Monday, the Mysuru district administration had contended that it had dispatched 250 cylinders to the Chamarajanagar hospital “on humanitarian grounds” on Sunday midnight.
“After I spoke to a medical oxygen supplier based in Mysuru at 11.45pm, another 50 cylinders were dispatched which reached at 2.20am,” Ravi said in a statement. “The Mysuru DC’s statement that 250 cylinders were sent to Chamarajanagar at midnight is not true,” he said.
A medical officer said about 15-20% of the total capacity of the plant is kept as buffer for technical reasons. “It’s always dangerous to use oxygen below the buffer limit,” the officer said. Authorities at the Hassan Institute of Medical Sciences, which has an oxygen storage plant of 13,000 kilo litres capacity, said around 8,500 kilo litres is supplied to patients and the remaining is stored as buffer.
(With inputs from Darshan DH in Hassan)
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