New Delhi: Twenty-five ‘sickest’ COVID-19 patients have died at Sir Ganga Ram Hospital here in the last 24 hours. The lives of another 60 such COVID-19 patients are at risk, officials said Friday. Sources said ‘low pressure oxygen’ could be the likely cause for the deaths of the patients. Hospitals and medical facilities in the national capital are reeling due to the shortage of oxygen with COVID-19 cases rising every hour.
“The oxygen stock will last another two hours. Ventilators and BiPAP machines are not working effectively,” a senior official at the hospital said. “Lives of another 60 ‘sickest’ patients at risk. Major crisis likely,” he added.
The hospital authorities are resorting to manual ventilation in ICUs and the emergency department, according to the official.
There are more than 500 coronavirus patients. Among them around 150 are on high flow oxygen support at the hospital located here.
Thursday night, the hospital officials had sent an SOS to the government. It said there are only five hours of oxygen left at the healthcare facility. It requested for urgent replenishment.
“At 8.00pm, oxygen in store is for five hours for peripheral use till 1.00 am and less for high flow use. Need urgent oxygen supplies,” an official had said. The hospital had received some oxygen around 12.30am, but the stock had to be supplemented later, sources said. “A tanker carrying two tonne of oxygen is stuck near Ambedkar Hospital,” a source said.
Several private hospitals in the city have been struggling to replenish their oxygen supply for the last four days. Some of them have even requested the Delhi government to transfer patients to other healthcare facilities.
Some hospitals have managed to make short-term arrangements. However, there is no immediate end to the crisis in sight, a Delhi government official had said Thursday.