As Maharashtra continues to report an upsurge in coronavirus infections, the government has decided to set up three jumbo field hospitals in Mumbai in the next five-six weeks, said city civic chief Iqbal Singh Chahal on Monday.
Each of these medical facilities will have a capacity of 2,000 beds, including 200 ICU beds and 70% oxygen beds. They will be set up at three different locations in the city, Chahal was quoted as saying by PTI.
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In addition to this, the government has also requested certain four-star and five -star hotels to create CCC2 facilities (Covid-19 care centres for patients), which will be "dovetailed and run by professionals from major private hospitals".
The decision was taken to ensure availability of beds for the needy patients by shifting those who have recovered substantially to the CCC2 facilities, said Chahal.
A "needy" patient are described as the one with "mild or serious symptoms or a Covid-19 patient with comorbidities".
Bed availability in Mumbai
According to Chahal, the number of ICU beds in the city has been increased to 2,466, with 325 new beds added in various hospitals.
As per the online bed allotment dashboard of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), there are 19,151 beds in 141 hospitals in Mumbai.
Out of the 19,151 beds, 3,777 beds in dedicated Covid-19 hospitals are currently vacant, Chahal said.
The BMC will operationalise 1,100 additional beds, including 125 ICU beds, in these medical facilities in the next seven days, he said.
The civic body has also decided to appoint nodal officers for an accurate and more proactive functioning of the 24 ward war rooms and the jumbo field hospitals from 11 pm to 7 am, Chahal said.
"The nodal officers shall function in two shifts - from 3 pm to 11 pm and 11 pm to 7 am - both at the ward war rooms and jumbo field hospitals," he said.
All laboratories conducting Covid-19 testing here have been instructed to give priority to swabs of symptomatic patients collected from homes and follow the new time schedules given to them, he added.
BMC order on hospital beds
The civic body had last month decided to discharge the Covid-19 patients who are asymptomatic in order to vacate hospitals beds for those with serious symptoms.
BMC said in an order that no asymptomatic Covid-19 patients without comorbidity would be allotted a hospital bed in any public or private hospitals.
Chahal had empowered assistant commissioners to take decisions at the ward-level and stressed activation of war rooms for better management of available beds, ICU beds, ventilators among others, as per the order.
Cases in Maharashtra
On Sunday, Mumbai reported 9,986 new cases of the viral infection and 79 deaths, which took its caseload to 5,20,498 and death toll to 12,023.
At present, there are 92,464 active Covid-19 cases in the metropolis, as per official data.
Maharashtra on Sunday reported its highest-ever single-day spike of coronavirus cases as the state added 63,294 new infections, taking the caseload to 34,07,245.
The state also witnessed 349 deaths. The death toll now stands at 57,987.
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