Indian leaders ‘must have an oxygen plan’
INDIA’S highest court has ordered the government to submit a plan on meeting New Delhi hospitals’ oxygen requirements within a day.
The Supreme Court decided against immediately punishing officials for failing to end a two-week long erratic supply of oxygen to overstretched hospitals.
“Ultimately putting officers in jail or hauling officers for contempt will not bring oxygen. Please tell us steps to solve this,” Justice Chandrachud said during the hearing.
It stayed the contempt notice issued to the government by a lower New Delhi High Court for defying its order on supplying adequate oxygen to more than 40 New Delhi hospitals. The government officials found guilty could have faced six months in prison or a fine.
With 382,315 new confirmed cases, India’s tally has risen to more than 20.6 million since the pandemic began.
The Health Ministry yesterday also reported 3,780 deaths in the last 24 hours, bringing the total to 226,188. Experts believe both figures are an undercount.
On Tuesday, the New Delhi High Court court, which had summoned two Home Ministry officials for a hearing yesterday, said that the grim reality is that hospitals are reducing the number of beds and asking patients to move elsewhere.
The court is hearing petitions filed by several hospitals and nursing homes struggling with irregular oxygen supplies. “You can put your head in the sand like an ostrich, we will not. We are not going to take no for an answer,” Justices Vipin Sanghi and Rekha Palli said.
Raghav Chaddha, a spokesman for the Aam Aadmi Party governing New Delhi, said hospitals were getting only 40% of their 700 metric ton requirements through the federal government, and the local government was arranging additional supplies to meet the shortfall and setting up new oxygen plants. The latest wave of infections since April has pushed India’s health care to the brink with people begging for oxygen cylinders and hospital beds on social media and news channels.
Bodies have been piling up at cremation grounds, with relatives waiting for hours for the last rites.
Meanwhile, India’s foreign minister has been forced to pull out of attending the G7 meeting in London in person after two positive coronavirus cases were detected in the country’s travelling delegation.
Subrahmanyam Jaishankar was participating virtually in the event after coming into contact with the suspected cases, although he has not tested positive.
Although India is not a G7 member, it had been invited to attend the meeting of foreign ministers as a guest. UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said “we are all having to adapt in agile ways” as he welcomed Mr Jaishankar on screen instead.