Remdesivir counter to be moved to Nehru stadium to manage crowd

CHENNAI: The special counter set up at Government Kilpauk Medical College Hospital (KMCH) would be moved to Nehru stadium to manage the crowd, the State government informed the Madras High Court on Thursday.

Advocate General R Shunmugasundaram made the submission before the first bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjib Banerjee and Justice Senthilkumar Ramamoorthy amid complaints from counsels present at the virtual hearing that the counter at the hospital was very crowded while those in other cities weren’t functional.

Denying the allegations, the Advocate General claimed that the counters in other cities were functional, and added that to tackle the crowd, the counter was being moved to Nehru stadium with 20,000 vials of Remdesivir placed at its disposal.

Recording the submission, Chief Justice Banerjee said, “At the moment, there does not appear to be much hue and cry over the non-availability of drugs, especially since the craze for Remdesivir has gone down with the public at large being aware that it may not be a life-saving drug but of limited efficacy.”

The Chief Justice also asked the government to place testing and vaccination centres at a distance from hospitals, subject to logistical considerations, so that there was lesser chance of contracting the virus. The Chief Justice also expressed shock to a submission that the government hospital in Puducherry was directing patients to obtain Remdesivir by offering a prescription. He said government hospitals could not prescribe the medicine and directed the government advocate to place the details before the court on Monday.

Also, noting that the situation appeared to be under control by and large and nothing untoward has been reported on account of lack of oxygen or the like, the Chief Justice said in the order: “However, to ensure that there is prevention of a large number of cases, immediate steps need to be taken to accelerate the rate of vaccination, including creating awareness among sections of people, particularly in the non-urban areas, of the need to take the vaccine to protect themselves.”

The Chief Justice also asked the government to place testing and vaccination centres at a distance from hospitals so that there was lesser chance of spread