Two die as hospital runs out of O2

Gurgaon: After six people died at a city hospital on Friday, two more patients lost their lives at Aryan Hospital on Sunday as it ran out of oxygen. The hospital management said they had informed the district administration about the crisis.
“We had informed the nodal officer and the deputy commissioner. But we failed to save the patients,” said Dr Vikram Aryan, the owner of Aryan Hospital, Old Railway Road. The facility needs 100 D-type cylinders (each can be used for 12-14 hours) daily. “I have 62 Covid patients. Of them, 17 are in ICU and four are on ventilator support. We have been requesting for refilling 100 D-type cylinders daily. We got a few on Sunday but for the past two days, we did not get supply,” Aryan said.
Officials said around 7 am on Sunday, they requested for oxygen and around 11 am, six cylinders were sent. But one patient died soon after. The second died around 3.30 pm. “I am working to install a plant at the hospital but that will take at least a month. It will be able to refill 53 cylinders daily. Currently, I have 25 oxygen concentrators,” Aryan added.
The district administration confirmed the deaths on Sunday. “We had given them cylinders. We will provide more soon. Those who died on Sunday were very ill,” said Yash Garg, deputy commissioner, Gurgaon.
On Friday night, six people at Kriti Hospital in Sector 56 died. Their relatives had alleged the facility did not have enough oxygen. Earlier on April 25, four patients had died at Kathuria Hospital after it ran out of supply.
Meanwhile, on Saturday evening, 70 metric tonnes of supply meant for Haryana was routed to Delhi. “Yes, oxygen allotted for Haryana was diverted to Delhi. We are trying to procure oxygen from our existing plants,” said Garg, adding that all city hospitals are getting oxygen supply on a rotational basis.
Gurgaon has been struggling to match its oxygen demand for about two weeks now with several private hospitals sending out SOSs messages. PN Kakar, CEO of Park Hospital, tweeted around 10.30 am on Sunday saying: “Liquid oxygen allocated quota for Park Hospital Gurgaon, hijacked to some other Hospital. More than 140 patients’ lives in danger (sic).”
Signature Hospital tweeted at 10.55 am. “We at Signature Hospital, Sector 37 D, Gurgaon are in dire need of Oxygen supply as our existing stock would last 4-5 hour more. With rising patients, our daily need is skyrocketing and rising. We need at least 1.5 Ton of Oxygen Supply (sic),” said the message.
“AarvyHospital Gurugram is struggling for #Oxygen for last 3 days. Kindly restore adequate Oxygen supply so that hospital can take more patients to treat (sic),” hospital officials tweeted on Sunday. On Sunday, Fortis hospital in Gurgaon stopped admitting fresh patients. “No ventilators are available. All are in use. If someone needs a ventilator, the patient will be asked to go somewhere else. Due to depleting oxygen stock, we are not admitting any new patients,” said Rahul Bhargava, director, bone marrow transplant programme, Fortis, Gurgaon.
A total of 71 facilities are treating Covid patients in the district, of which 16 are dependent on liquid oxygen supply.
According to the district oxygen monitoring team, there are 55 smaller hospitals which have a daily need of 21 metric tonnes. They have a total of 698 cylinders, which have to be refilled regularly.
At present, the district has five refilling stations — Max Air, Star Oxygen, GK Papreja, SK Gases and Kalinga. Of the total allotment of 35 metric tonnes, 11 city hospitals are getting a total of 25 metric tonnes daily.
The hospitals are Medanta (7 metric tonnes), Park (3), Artemis (3), Fortis (3), Max (2), Metro (2), Medeor (1), Paras (1), Signature (1), Civil Hospital (1) and Narayana (1). Remaining 10 metric tonnes are being distributed among five other hospitals and refilling stations.