State disburses Rs 100 cr to provide free treatment to patients admitted in Covid dedicated private hospitals

Kolkata: In the fight to save people from Covid, the Mamata Banerjee government has ensured free-of-cost treatment to patients even in Covid dedicated private hospitals and is paying around Rs 2 lakh for 14-days treatment of each patient.

At present, the state government has requisitioned 55 private hospitals across the state as Covid dedicated apart from the 32 state-run establishments where the state government is bearing the entire treatment cost of each patient who was admitted after getting afflicted with the disease. It is also the responsibility of the state government to provide them with food during their stay at these 87 hospitals.

According to a senior official of the state Health department, already more than Rs 100 crore was being disbursed to these private hospitals that were being requisitioned by the state government to fight against the pandemic.

Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has repeatedly said that Bengal is the only state where completely free of cost treatment is provided to Covid patients at state-run hospitals and private hospitals that were requisitioned by her government. But some private health establishments, not requisitioned by the state government, are charging exorbitantly. The West Bengal Clinical Establishment Regulatory Commission (WBCERC), however, is taking stringent measures following necessary inquiry against such health establishments as and when any complaint is coming against them.

In recent times commission directed health establishments including R-Fleming Hospitals, BP Poddar Hospital, Dum Dum ILS Hospital to refund money to patients or their family members for charging excessively. The Commission had even lodged a suo motu case against Desun Hospital for allegedly not admitting a 60-year-old Covid patient for failing to deposit Rs 3 lakh for admission and barred it from collecting advance from any patient at the time of admission besides directing to deposit Rs 10 lakh with the Commission.

A probe has also been initiated against Jagannath Gupta Hospital in Budge Budge for allegedly demanding Rs 1 lakh from a Covid patient though he was entitled to get free treatment. According to a notification, the state government decided to reimburse the charges to the requisitioned hospitals for the treatment of Covid patients at "the package rate approved by the Finance Department".

In a bid to get the payment authorities of the requisitioned private hospital needs to submit details of each patient including his or her date of admission and discharge, total number of days admitted in hospital, etc. Now all details are also being put in the Covid Patient Management System.

As stated, the estimated cost for treatment of Covid patients in the requisitioned hospital under the West Bengal Health Scheme is around Rs 22,200 for the first day and Rs 14,200 for each of the next 13 days if admitted in an Intensive Care Unit. The same gets reduced to Rs 21,600 and Rs 13,600 if a patient is under treatment in an isolation bed.

The components that are included in the package for a day include ventilator charges (if needed), doctors consultation fees that have been capped to Rs 1,000, different tests, medicine and special nursing in two shifts. The cost of medical investigations and medicine may vary due to other comorbidities of a patient. The state government also pays even if any additional medicine is required for a patient.

As many as 13,4260 people were discharged till date from all health establishments after getting cured from Covid and the mortality rate has dropped to 2 per cent as an arrangement made by the state government with 790 ventilators against 1,243 beds in dedicated Covid hospitals.

Dr Nirmal Maji, chairman of Rogi Kalyan Samity at the Calcutta Medical College and Hospital, said: "It is the humane approach of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee that ensured free-of-cost treatment for thousands of Covid patients in the state."