Sharp fall in cases, but most Covid ICU beds remain full
NEW DELHI: Even as Delhi continues to witness a steady decline of daily new Covid-19 cases, the number of seriously ill patients has remained nearly stagnant , with most ICU beds in big private hospitals remaining almost full.
The number of Covid-19 cases has reduced from a 7-day average of 18,374 (May 3-9) in the first week of May to 3,285 (May 17-23) in the third week of the month, and the number of hospitalisations declined by 33% in this period, but the ICU occupancy has declined by only 5.6%.
Doctors and government officials said this is because of extremely critical patients reaching hospitals during the peak and long recovery time in ICUs. HT analysed government data between May 10 and May 22 and found that while the number of active cases in Delhi has seen a decline of 67%, and the number of non-ICU patients by 59%, the number of ICU-patients has remained almost stagnant.
Indeed, some days including May 12, 13 and 14, the number of ICU patients were even higher than May 10. From May 10 to May 22, the number of ICU patients has declined by 11% -indicating that the pace of recovery of serious Covid-19 patients is way longer than those with milder symptoms.
During the entire 13-day period, the number of ICU patients in Delhi remained above 5,000 till May 20 . It was only from May 21 that it went down below 5000.
At the worst of this crisis, only 13.6% of Delhi’s Covid-19 beds were empty (16,942 occupied and 2,666 vacant) on April 20, while six days after that the city had completely run out of ICU beds for the general public, according to government data. Currently, of the total 28,485 beds across the Capital, 8,791 are occupied and 19,694 are vacant.
Dr SCL Gupta, medical superintendent of Batra hospital said, “The numbers have started coming down over the last two or three days. But it will take another two weeks for the ICUs to empty out. These are still patients who were admitted during the peak.”
The number of cases in Delhi peaked on April 20, with 28,395; the hospital occupancy on May 6, with 20,117 ; and the number of people in ICUs at 5,813 on May 12. The longer ICU stay led to a clogging up of the system at the peak, said Dr Sumit Ray, critical care specialist and medical superintendent of Holy Family hospital.“That is the timeline of Covid-19. Those who get critically ill, tend to have a long hospital stay. In the ICU, those who are not on ventilators take about two to three weeks to recover and those who are on ventilators could take up to a month. During the peak, the beds in ICU were completely full and that is the reason people were running from hospital to hospital,” he added.
However, the availability of ICU beds has improved markedly. But if the current occupancy of ICU beds is just over 62%, it is largely because of ICU capacity added in the city over the last three weeks.
The Delhi government created two makeshift 500-bed ICU-only facilities on vacant grounds and attached them to Lok Nayak and GTB hospitals. Another 200 were added at the Radha Saomi facility in Chhatarpur.
“Now, we are getting only three to four patients a day and not all of them need ICU care. So, most of the patients currently admitted to the ICU are those who were taken in during the peak. Patients in ICU, especially those on ventilators, need a long time to recover. The numbers are likely to start coming down over the next couple of weeks,” said a senior doctor from Rajeev Gandhi super speciality hospital who asked not to be named.
Capital adds 1,550 more Covid-19 infections
Delhi on Monday reported 1,550 new cases of Covid-19, the lowest since March 30 this year, when the city saw 992 cases.
The positivity rate rose marginally on Monday to 2.52%, from 2.42% on Sunday.
The city however reported 207 more deaths due to Covid-19 on Monday, taking the total toll of the infection to 23,409 in the city. “The number of deaths will start coming down only 15 to 20 days after the number of cases peaked. There are several patients still admitted to the intensive care units and these are the sickest patients so some of them will die,” said Dr SCL Gupta, medical superintendent of Batra hospital.
Experts warned against anybody letting their guard up, and said the government must focus on aggressive vaccination while the caseload is low.
However, the number of Covid-19 vaccinations have halved in Delhi due to a shortage of doses for those between the ages of 18 and 45.
“There is likely to be another surge in cases in Delhi – there have been three distinct surges in the city three to four months apart. This period has to be utilised to give at least the first dose of the vaccine to as many as possible. It looks like that the number of doses available will go up from July. After that, there is a need for aggressive vaccination. That is the only hope for preventing another surge,” said Dr Amit Singh, associate professor at Indian Institute of Science – Bengaluru.
DOCTORS AND GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS SAID THIS IS BECAUSE OF EXTREMELY CRITICAL PATIENTS REACHING HOSPITALS DURING THE PEAK AND LONG RECOVERY TIME IN ICUS.