COVID-19 Pune: Centre gives additional 100 ventilators to city from PM Cares fund

Pune: The central government has given 100 more ventilators from the PM Cares funds to the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) which will play a crucial role in bringing down the case fatality ratio in the city. Earlier, the centre had given 13 ventilators from PM Cares fund to Pune city on July 1.

Of the newly approved ventilator supplies, some ventilators are expected to arrive in the city on Wednesday (July 29). This was informed during an online meeting attended by Union Minister Prakash Javadekar, State Health Minister Rajesh Tope, Pune City Mayor Murlidhar Mohol, State Principal Secretary Pradeep Vyas, Divisional Commissioner Dr Deepak Mhaisekar, Special Officer Saurabh Rao and other senior officials.

The discussion in this meeting revolved around the issue of shortage of ventilators and Intensive Care Unit (ICU) beds in Pune city. Javadekar agreed to provide 100 ventilators to Pune city from the PM Cares fund and also asked civic and district administration to take help of State Reserve Police Force (SRPF) for effective implementation of lockdown norms especially in the containment zones.

Few hours before this announcement was made, a central government monitoring team headed by Kunal Kumar, Joint Secretary of Housing and Urban Affairs, had instructed Pune district officials to bring down the case fatality ratio down to zero per cent from existing 2.38 per cent by analysing the exact reasons behind patient deaths. Kumar, along with two other members in the team – Dr Arvind Kushwaha and Dr Simikanta Banerjee, both additional professors at AIIMS – had held a review meeting about COVID-19 at the Divisional Commissioner Office on Tuesday.

Kumar had emphasised that the administration should be responsive and prompt while providing treatment to COVID-19 patients. “Officials should analyse in detail the reasons behind the deaths of COVID positive patients and take effective measures to bring down the case fatality ratio to zero,” he had stated.

In the earlier lot, the central government had given 300 ventilators to Maharashtra state of which 13 were allotted to Pune city. These ventilators were placed at the Sassoon general hospital. About 313 ventilators are available in public hospitals of Pune city and the new lot would add to this capacity.