Shortage hits another Delhi hosp, 20 more die

Twenty people died at Delhi’s Jaipur Golden Hospital, their lives ebbing as the hospital waited for oxygen to be replenished on Saturday, day five of a crisis stemming from an acute shortage of oxygen imperilling critically-ill COVID patients in India’s national capital.

Every few hours, as it has been for much of the week, hospitals across the city and its suburbs, including Ganga Ram and Max Healthcare as well as smaller facilities, sounded the alarm about dwindling stocks on social media and other platforms. Desperate for help, some hospitals approached the Delhi High Court.

With the situation getting increasingly more desperate, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal wrote to his counterparts in other states, requesting for oxygen and saying the Centre was helping but the crisis was so severe that all available resources were proving to be inadequate. At the Jaipur Golden Hospital in southwest Delhi’s Rohini locality, the worst fears had come true and fears were the disaster could repeat itself. “Next impending oxygen crisis in Jaipur Golden Hospital. Over 200 lives at stake if liquid medical oxygen is not supplied by 9:00 PM tonight,” the hospital tweeted at 7.15 pm. Outside the hospitals, scenes of despair played out with queues of ambulances, frantic relatives and patients gasping for breath as they waited for help and hospitals, overwhelmed and helpless, tried to deal with the multiple emergencies at their doorstep. The story found echo in hospital after hospital.