New Delhi: In an unfortunate incident at this time of corona crisis, 8 COVID-19 patients, including the HOD of gastroenterology department, at Delhi’s Batra Hospital died due to oxygen shortage, the hospital said in a statement on Saturday. “We are trying to revive five other critical patients,” said Dr SCL Gupta.
The development comes at a time when the hospitals across the national capital have sent out SOS messages last week about depleting supplies of oxygen. However, the Delhi government has maintained that the city is not getting its allocated quantity of the life-saving gas.
As per the latest updates, among the 8 dead patients, six were admitted to the hospital’s ICU (intensive care unit) and two were in the wards. The doctor who died has been identified as Dr RK Himathani, the head of the Gastroenterology unit.
Earlier in the day, Batra Hospital’s Executive Director, Dr Sudhanshu Bankata, issued a video SOS. “We have just run out of oxygen… currently surviving on some cylinders. Over the next 10 minutes that will also run out. We are again in crisis mode. The Delhi government is trying to help but believe their tanker is still some distance away,” he said.
Responding to the incident, Delhi Water Minister Raghav said: “Our SOS cryogenic tanker carrying Liquid Medical Oxygen is reaching Batra Hospital within five minutes. Their regular supplier of oxygen has defaulted yet again due to alleged ‘lack of oxygen supplies’ and is being pulled up.”
Notably, this is the second time in one week that Batra Hospital has run out of medical oxygen. On April 24 the hospital received a last-minute re-supply that arrived minutes after its supply ran out. Moreover, the Batra Hospital is among several hospitals in the national capital battling a crippling oxygen shortage that has endangered the lives of thousands of Covid and non-Covid patients.