4 panels to inspect facilities with higher Covid-19 death rates

NEWDELHI: The Delhi government has set up four committees of four members each to inspect hospitals and wards that are reporting the highest number of Covid-19 deaths in the city. The panels have been asked to submit their suggestions on reducing deaths to principal health secretary Vikram Dev Dutt by August 3, the order states.

“Four committees comprising of specialists, two from internal medicine and another two from anaesthesia, have been constituted for inspecting the allotted hospitals to examine whether the standard treatment protocols for treating Covid patients are being followed,” an order from health secretary Padmini Singla read.

Hospitals to be inspected include private ones like Fortis Escorts Heart Institute, Max Hospital (Saket), St Stephen’s hospital, Sir Ganga Ram Hospital, Jaipur Golden hospital and Sri Balaji Action Medical Institute, and government facilities such as Ram Manohar Lohia, Safdarjung, Lok Nayak, and GTB hospitals. Some of the Capital’s major Covid-19 treatment facilities, these often receive many patients with severe symptoms.

The committee consists of doctors from hospitals managing Covid-19 like Lok Nayak and Safdarjung as well as non-covid hospitals like Deen Dayal Upadhyay hospital, Lal Bahadur Shastri Hospital, and Aruna Asaf Ali government hospital.

“There has been a reduction in the number of deaths due to corona, however, we need to reduce it further. Today, we constituted four committees that will inspect hospitals and provide suggestion --- 1. Where there have been more deaths, 2. Where there have been more deaths in the wards, meaning patients were not moved to the ICU on time,” said Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal in a tweet.