Jammu and Kashmir hospitals gasp for oxygen as Covid-19 cases soar

Hospitals in Jammu and Kashmir have been running perilously low on oxygen amid rising demand for beds as the Union Territory recorded its highest single-day Covid-19 tally on Tuesday with 2,030 positive cases.

According to the Covid-19 media bulletin on Monday, 441 patients were admitted to hospitals in Kashmir for treatment while the number of patients admitted in Jammu stood at 261. Currently, the Union Territory has a total of 11,467 active Covid-19 cases and of the known positive cases, just over 6% have been admitted to hospitals.

In November 2020, the rate of admission was higher with the number standing at approximately 12% of the total people who tested Covid-19 positive, media bulletin archives show.

On 17 November 2020, for example, 672 of the 5,585 active cases needed hospital admission and 414 of these were on oxygen support. On Monday, 462 patients were on oxygen support.

Read: The Covid-19 challenge in India

A senior medico at tertiary care SKIMS hospital in Srinagar said that at the moment, Kashmir wasn't facing the mammoth load that hospitals in Delhi, Mumbai or other cities in the country have been burdened with.

“In fact, we are more or less where we were six month ago in terms of patient load. However, given the steep rise in positive cases and subsequent hospitalization in the last one week, it appears that very soon, hospital beds in Kashmir fitted with an oxygen port will run out,” he said, adding that the situation was still manageable but in next few days, the new wave of infections might come like a storm.

When asked about the number of oxygen beds available to cater to the growing load of Covid-19 cases, Dr Mushtaq Ahmed Rather, Director Health Services Kashmir, couldn’t come up with a figure.

He said the Mechanical Division of the J&K government was working to make the oxygen plants functional but was not clear on the timeline of its completion.