New Delhi: Amid several states flagging scarcity of medical oxygen in the COVID-19 fight, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said Friday that the Railways and Air Force are being deployed to reduce the transportation time for oxygen tankers. Narendra Modi asserted that all state governments need to work together to meet requirements of life-saving gas and medicines.
Modi was chairing a high-level meeting with chief ministers of 11 states and Union Territories (UTs) with maximum COVID-19 cases. He urged the states to work as one and coordinate with one another to fulfil medical requirements. Modi asserted ‘if we work as one nation, there will not be any scarcity of resources’.
The prime minister asserted that every state should ensure that no oxygen tanker, irrespective of its destination, is stopped or gets stranded, a statement said. His call for coordination and working together to meet the spiralling health crisis comes amid multiple reports of medical oxygen supply being stopped at borders of one state or the other during transit.
Hospitals in many states have complained of a shortage in their oxygen supply and sent out SOS messages. It has requested governments to take urgent measures to increase the production and supply of the life-saving gas.
Modi noted that the Railways and Air Force have been deployed to reduce the travel time of oxygen tankers and assured states of the Centre’s full support in the fight against the pandemic.
It was the prime minister’s third meeting with chief ministers in the last five weeks, while he also held his fourth review meeting in one week to review the oxygen availability situation, officials said.
Modi asked states to take stringent measures against hoarding and black marketing of essential medicines and injections. He also called for making people continuously aware so that they do not indulge in panic buying. He said that with united efforts, they will together be able to stop this second wave of the pandemic across India.
With some opposition-ruled states criticising the Centre’s recently announced vaccination policy as discriminatory against states, Modi said that the Union government has already provided them more than 15 crore doses free of cost.
Noting that the virus is affecting several states as well as tier 2 and tier 3 cities at once, the prime minister called for working together to fight the pandemic with collective power.
He said the biggest reason for India’s success during the first wave of the pandemic was its united efforts and strategy and reiterated that the Centre and states will have to address this challenge in the same way. He urged chief ministers to set up a high-level coordination committee to carry oxygen to different hospitals of the state.
This coordination committee should ensure that as soon as there is an allotment of oxygen from the Centre, it can deliver oxygen as per requirement in different hospitals of the state immediately, Modi pointed out.
Along with upgrading of resources, states have to focus on testing for the infection, Modi said, stressing that widespread testing should be conducted so that people get the facility easily.