Delhi's Batra Hospital Says Doctor Among Those Dead After It Ran Out Of Oxygen

Batra Hospital ran out of medical oxygen for the second time in a week (File)

Several people, including one doctor, died at Delhi's Batra Hospital on Saturday afternoon after the facility ran out of medical oxygen - for the second time in the space of a week - at 12.45 pm.

Hospital officials told the Delhi High Court - holding a 11th straight day of hearings into the oxygen crisis in the national capital - that re-supply tankers only reached the hospital at around 1.30 pm, meaning that around 230 critically ill patients were without oxygen for around 80 minutes.

"We ran out of oxygen at 12.45 pm. Supply came at 1.30. We were out of oxygen for 1 hour and 20 mins," the hospital told the court.

"We hope no lives were lost," the court responded, to which the hospital said: "We have... including one of our own... one doctor."

Earlier today 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 runout. We are again in crisis mode. The Delhi government is trying to help but believe their tanker is still some distance away," he said.

Minutes later, at 12.01 pm, the hospital informed the court it was running out oxygen, again.

"We are in SOS since 6 am today morning... we have 307 patients admitted, out of whom 230 are on oxygen support," the hospital had said.

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.

Batra Hospital is among several in the national capital battling a crippling oxygen shortage that has endangered the lives of thousands of Covid and non-Covid patients.

Last week 25 people at the city's Jaipur Golden Hospital died due to shortage of medical oxygen.

India has been hit by a devastating wave of Covid infections - daily new cases crossed the four-lakh mark this morning for a record global high. The surge in cases has left hospitals overworked, doctors traumatised, and resources like beds, medicines and oxygen in perilously short supply.

With input from PTI