Delhi government reduces beds for Covid-19 as cases continue to drop

NEW DELHI: As cases of the novel coronavirus continued to dip in the national capital, the Delhi government further reduced the number of beds reserved for infected patients. 

In a government order, six of the state-run hospitals have been removed from the list of Covid-19 facilities.

Facilities such as GTB Hospital, Deen Dayal Upadhaya Hospital, Deep Chand Bandhu Hospital, Sanjay Gandhi Memorial, Hospital, Acharya Shree Bhikshu Hospital, SRC hospital will now resume full operations for non-Covid services.

“Consequent upon reduction in reporting of Covid-19 cases in Delhi, the competent authority has decided to de-escalate the number of dedicated beds reserved for Covid in hospitals of Delhi government with immediate effect,” read the order.

In five other state government facilities—Lok Nayak Hospital, Rajiv Gandhi Super Specialty Hospital, Baba Saheb Ambedkar Hospital, Burari Hospital and Ambedkar Nagar Hospital—have are now partially Covid hospitals.

Lok Nayak Hospital currently has 300 beds for admission of infected patients while there are 500 beds at RJSSH, 50 at BSA, 320 at Burari Hospital and 300 at Ambedkar Nagar hospital.

Earlier this week, a healthcare providers’ association had told the Delhi high Court that various private hospitals, which were earlier asked to reserve 80 per cent ICU beds for Covid-19 patients, were satisfied with the Delhi government’s recent decision to reduce the number to 25 per cent.

As per the daily health bulletin, only two fatalities have been recorded in the last 24 hours. As many as 154 fresh coronavirus cases were registered on Friday.

With this, the tally of cases in the national capital has reached over 6.35 lakh, while the death toll mounted to 10,873.