Six pvt hospitals run out of O2, hang by a thread; scores reporting acute shortages

New Delhi: Amid the unprecedented oxygen crisis that the Capital is facing along with the rest of the country and as Covid emergency wards see patients dying outside hospitals every day, the third day of the crisis here saw relatively smaller private hospitals in the city first run out of medical oxygen, before bigger hospitals started running out of their stocks that were just about replenished the night before in the nick of time.

On Thursday, data compiled by the Delhi government showed that at least six private hospitals had completely exhausted their oxygen supply by evening. The Shanti Mukund Hospital in Karkardooma, one of these hospitals made desperate pleas to get its supply back and its CEO Dr SK Saggar also broke down on camera saying, "How can we tell patients family that we don't have oxygen for their kin... the patients will die."

Eventually, the hospital put up a signboard saying that no admissions could be allowed as the hospital had no more oxygen, following which patients had started to be discharged to be shifted to other facilities.

Dr Saggar said, "We're hardly left with any oxygen. We've requested doctors to discharge patients, whoever can be discharged...It (Oxygen) may last for 2 hrs or something."

And in the mayhem, patients and doctors started running pillar to post looking either for a bed or for oxygen.

However, by 11:30 pm on Thursday, the Delhi Police had managed to create a green corridor for the hospital from its supplier INOX's location outside the state and the hospital was handed over 2,300 kilograms of liquified oxygen, following a distress call from the hospitals.

The police in the city have also been buckling under the pressure of distress calls from hospitals.

Meanwhile, at Najafgarh's Rathi hospital, another hospital that had exhausted its oxygen supply by Thursday evening, the situation was desperate with doctors and patients' kin struggling to keep patients alive on an hourly basis based on stray oxygen cylinders.

The hospital had in fact been surviving this way on single or twin cylinders since Tuesday night and the Delhi Police had also helped them get a few cylinders on Thursday morning. But the shortage was so acute that by evening, fresh SOS messages were sent out.

"We are arranging the oxygen cylinders from any shop that could provide us with it. Even if we get one oxygen cylinder we are bringing it," a superintendent at the hospital said, struggling to find newer places to arrange cylinders from.

Patients whose family members were a wreck outside said that every one hour there is an oxygen crisis. A patient was asked to go with the hospital staff to pick up oxygen cylinders. "My wife is admitted here and there is no oxygen supply, so I am going with the staff to pick it up," he told Millennium Post.

Outside the hospital were five to eight oxygen cylinders. "These cylinders will work for 30 to 40 minutes more after that we would need more oxygen," a healthcare worker said.

A family member of a patient admitted said, "My mother was admitted the day before yesterday and she is on oxygen, but today they turned it off saying they have no supply," Ritika, said.

In addition to this, at least 20 more hospitals both government and private had reported oxygen shortage by Thursday evening, including two Max hospitals in Shalimar Bagh and Patparganj, Aakash Healthcare, St Stephen's, Sir Ganga Ram Saroj Super Speciality, Balaji Action Hospital and several other small private hospitals.

Moreover, six major Delhi government hospitals had also reported shortages, including Burari, DDU Hospital, GTB hospital, Rajiv Gandhi Hospital, Ambedkar Nagar hospital and Babasaheb Ambedkar hospital.

At Delhi's Lifeline Hospital, announcements were made where families of 70 critical patients were requested to get discharged or arrange oxygen with Mustafeez Mehdi saying seven of them were likely to die if they did not receive high-flow oxygen.

"We want to inform people that we have no oxygen left at the hospital. We request the people to either take patients to a different hospital or arrange the oxygen from somewhere. We have tried our best and have contacted our SDM officers for the same. The oxygen we have will last half an hour," a healthcare worker was seen announcing in the hospital.

COO of Aakash Multi Speciality Hospital, Dr. Kousar A Shah said, "We have 236 Covid patients admitted out of which 70-80 per cent need a continuous supply of oxygen. We received some 50 oxygen cylinders from various vendors but they will be able to survive for one to two hours only," he said on Thursday evening.

Dr K Preetham, additional Chief of Medical Administration at the Indian Spinal Injuries Centre also said his hospital was in the midst of a "major oxygen crisis", adding that the liquid oxygen would last them till midnight and the backup cylinders till 9 am on Thursday. "I am being forced to admit the patients and I do not have oxygen beds available," he added.

However, by the time this report was filed, some major hospitals such as Sir Ganga Ram had been assured by the Delhi government that the requisite supply was on its way and that hospitals would get it by the end of the night.