Corporates come forward to augment beds

Bengaluru: The state government has appointed Harsha P S, Commissioner of Information and Public Relations, as the nodal officer for setting up 500 ICU beds in each zone of Bengaluru.

Speaking to DH, Harsha said a number of corporates have come forward to assist the government in the process and the team is leveraging the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) funds towards augmenting beds.

“Texas Instruments has come forward to set up a modular ICU unit with 86 critical care beds which would be set up at the Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Chest Diseases,” he said.

Other companies have promised to fund 69 ICU beds which would be set up at Leprosy Hospital, Epidemic disease hospital, and Jayanagar General Hospital, he added.

Asked how the locations were being identified, Harsha said the team has planned to convert general beds in government hospitals and government medical colleges into oxygenated and ICU beds.

This, he opined, would reduce the turnaround time and also prevent the need to employ extra manpower as the existing staff can be used along with the final-year medical students.

However, not all the facilities will be similar. The kind of facility will largely depend on the CSR partner, he said. He also pointed out that along with the CSR funds, the government was receiving donations in the form of medical equipment which would be used by the team to convert the beds to ICU ones.

The team is communicating with a number of corporates, constantly to utilise the available CSR funds towards bed augmentation. "Collaborating with all of them to increase scale and speed is our main challenge,” Harsha explained.

"The team is working on a war footing. We will set up as many beds as as quickly as possible,” he said.