Prayagraj is well-equipped to handle any spurt in Covid-19 cases, says CMO

PRAYAGRAJ: The district is ready to attend and treat Covid-19 cases even if there is a spurt in coronavirus infection in coming weeks as the preparations made during the third wave of the pandemic and also in the past four-five months would come in handy, said health department officials.
“We are fully geared up to meet any sudden spurt in the number of cases, including those needing hospitalisation,” said chief medical officer (CMO) Prayagraj Dr Nanak Saran.He said that despite a comparative spurt during the past one week, the number of active cases remains at just 1,179 with the majority of them being in home isolation. “Moreover, so far no hospital staff including doctors, nurses or ward boys, etc., has been testing positive for Covid-19,” he added.
This is a welcome development as during the past two waves in Prayagraj, over half-a-dozen government doctors and paramedical staff besides over a dozen private doctors had lost their lives and dozens of others had tested positive including many of them more than once. However, hardly a handful of patients were required to be sent out of the city to bigger centres for treatment during the first two waves.
The CMO said that in light of the Covid-19 resurgence, leaves of doctors and all other medical staff of the district have been cancelled with immediate effect.
“As many as 100 doctors in Level-3 SRN Hospital and 28 doctors in Level-2 Tej Bahadur Sapru (Beli) Hospital have been kept on high alert. They can be pressed into service at very short notice,” he added.
Officials said that unlike during the first two waves when getting oxygen was a challenge, now nine additional oxygen plants have been made functional in the district making many of the hospitals and even many bigger CHCs self-reliant in terms of oxygen supply.
Regarding bed capacity, public health expert of CMO office said, “Presently, around 1,500 beds, all with oxygen supply, for Covid-19 patents are ready in the district in government hospitals, including maximum 1,066 at Level-3 SRN Hospital, 226 at Level-2 Tej Bahadur Sapru (Beli) Hospital and 100 at Level-2 Railway Hospital besides 30 beds each at Level-1 rural community health centres (CHCs) of Manda, Ramnagar and Kotwa and 18 beds at CHC-Phulpur.”
“If we include private hospitals, presently there are 5,600 beds available for treating Covid-19 patients in the district,” he added.
“If needed, we can further increase the count of beds by another around 500 by roping in the present non-Covid-19 hospitals that include Government TB Hospital at Teliyarganj besides Moti Lal Nehru (Colvin) Divisional Hospital and Dufferin Hospital,” he told TOI.
“At present we also have 200 isolation beds in SRN Hospital besides around 353 ICU beds and around 350 ventilators for Covid-19 patients in the district just in government hospitals,” the health official explained. MLN Medical College principal Dr SP Singh said, “The Covid-19 testing lab running in the microbiology department of the college presently has a capacity to conduct 8,000 to 10,000 RT-PCR tests as per need. SRN Hospital, the largest of all government hospitals in the district, is fully ready to treat Covid-19 patients.”
He added, “Compared to the first two waves, the medical infrastructure has witnessed a fillip with over 80 new ventilators, 150 high-end multiparameter monitors for monitoring vital signs of patients, 100 other high-end monitors as well as paediatric intensive care unit (PICU) and High Dependency Unit (HDU) added to the hospital’s resources.”