There is severe crisis in the availability of hospital beds for the COVID-19 patients in Anantapur district and all suspected cases with symptoms invariably land at the Government General Hospital here and wait endlessly for preliminary COVID screening or Triage. Patients waited in ambulances outside the infectious diseases and COVID wards for hours on Tuesday at the GGH unable to get admission into the 164 available beds earmarked for these patients.
The Government Hospital here needs to be converted into exclusive State COVID-19 hospital as suggested by Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy, feel MLAs and MPs. This will make close to 700 hospital beds available exclusively for COVID-19 patients instead of spreading them all over the district or city, thus saving on manpower requirement at different locations.
District registered 674 positive cases on Monday and 458 cases on Tuesday straining the medical infrastructure to a great extent. The cumulative number of positive patients has crossed 6,000-mark on Tuesday.
People are admitted in the two private designated COVID-19 hospitals only if patients test positive or have severe symptoms with co-morbidities needing oxygen or ventilation. The District Administration is promoting home isolation for the majority of the patients, but due to stigma, they get shifted to COVID Care Centres (CCC), where basic amenities are insufficient.
Immense public pressure is building up for having more number of hospital beds for treating COVID-19 patients with a steep spike in the number of positive cases in the past 15 days. Anantapur Urban MLA Anantha Venkatarami Reddy is vigorously pitching for converting the GGH into State COVID-19 Hospital.
“All the non-Covid cases can be shifted from the GGH to private hospitals depending on their specialisation, as Covid cases are not treated there. With limited number of doctors and paramedical staff more number of patients can be managed at one place,” Mr. Venkatarami Reddy told The Hindu. There are three large convention centres / marriage halls with adequate rooms and bathrooms, which can be coveted into Covid Care Centres and the owners had agreed to the proposal from District Administration two months ago, but why some other alternatives were being searched for immediate need, he wondered.
District Collector Gandham Chandrudu said he had sent all the details on the infrastructure available in Anantapur to the State government and it was up to them to decide if the GGH should be converted into a State COVID-19 Hospital or not.