Govt to expand city ambulance fleet: 1,000 vehicles by June 31

nNEW DELHI: With the number of cases of coronavirus disease (Covid-19) rising in the city, the Delhi government plans to expand its ambulance fleet to 1,000 by June-end to meet the increasing demand.

To augment the fleet, the government has also requested the police to provide 100 PCR vehicles to be used as ambulance. Four other companies have been asked to provide more ambulances to help the government reach the fleet strength of 1,000.

In its communication to the companies and the police, the government has said, “Due to increasing number of calls in view of Covid-19, the fleet of ambulance is required to be augmented to up to 1,000 by June 30. Department of Health and Family

Welfare is striving to arrange for this additional requirement of ambulances at the earliest.”

Currently, the state government through its Centralised Accident and Trauma Services (CATS) runs about 200 ambulances. Another 170 ambulances have been added through contracts with private ambulance companies and the Army.

Of these, 163 are currently on ‘Corona duty’ ferrying patients from home to hospital, transfer between hospitals, and take people who don’t have personal vehicles to testing centres.

As per data provided by the government in the daily health bulletin, there were 243 request calls for Covid-19 ambulances.

“The requirement for ambulances has dipped a little after the lockdown. This is because now most people can use their own vehicles to take patients to hospitals. However, the requirement is likely to pick up with the number of Covid-19 patients increasing and several needing hospitalisations,” said a health department official.

So far, Delhi has 53,116 cases of Covid-19 and 2,035 people have died of it.

The government anticipates that the number of cases is likely to touch 1 lakh by the end of the month and 5.5 lakh by the end of July.

The government is also working to increase the number of phone lines for ambulance services. It has contacted WIPRO, the company that helped the government set up the modern control room in Laxmi Nagar to increase the number of telephone line to 60 from the current 30, “to minimise the call-waiting time for a citizen in need of ambulance services.”