The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), on Saturday, established two new COVID-19 Care Centers (CCC) at Haj Bhavan in Byatarayanapura and Kempegowda Community Hall in Mahalakshmi Layout of Bengaluru. The Haj Bhavan has a bed capacity of 100 oxygenated beds and Kempegowda Community Hall has a capacity of 46 oxygenated beds.
Karnataka Revenue Minister R Ashoka, who inaugurated the CCC at Haj Bhavan, told reporters that the Haj Bhavan has a facility of 400 beds and in the first phase, 100 beds have been converted into oxygenated beds. In the second phase, 50 HDU and 50 ICU beds will be converted. He further said that the required facilities for the same have already arrived.
Both of the CCCs will also act as physical triage centres where patients can directly walk in and get admitted. The physicians at the CCC will assess the condition of the patients and direct them with further actions required. To ensure that there is an adequate oxygen supply, over 800 oxygen concentrators are also placed in these CCCs, according to the BBMP.
The Karnataka government, on Saturday, passed an order which stated that the regional commissioners of the Revenue Division are being appointed as nodal officers to allot and distribute oxygen to all the hospitals in each of their jurisdictions. This decision, according to the order, came after the Karnataka State Legal Service Authority (KSLSA) submitted a report following the direction of the Karnataka High Court. The High Court had given this direction while hearing about the incident that took place at Chamarajanagar District Hospital in the wee hours between May 2 and May 3, where several COVID-19 patients lost their lives after oxygen supply ran out.
On Saturday, the second and third oxygen express reached the Inland Container Depot at Whitefield in Bengaluru. The second oxygen express reached at 3.20 am which had started from Kalinganagar in Jajapur district of Odisha. The third oxygen express reached at 05.10 pm and it came from Tatanagar in Jharkhand. A signal-free ‘Green Corridor’ was created to enable swift transport of these oxygen expresses, which meant that these trains did not have to wait for crossing or passage of another train.
Each train carried six cryogenic containers and each cryogenic container carried 20 tonnes of liquid medical oxygen amounting to a total of 120 tonnes per train. The total tonnage of oxygen that Karnataka has received from both trains is 240 tonnes.