16 COVID Care Centres shut

SOPs not followed; some of them indulged in money-making activity: MLA Ramdas

Mysore/Mysuru: At a time when the city needs more and more infrastructure to handle multiplying virus infections, the District Administration has decided to close down 16 COVID Care Centres set up in all the three Assembly Constituencies — Krishnaraja, Narasimharaja and Chamaraja. 

At a meeting of City Advisory Task Force held yesterday, Chairman MLA S.A. Ramdas urged the Government to close these centres following complaints of not having infrastructure and also medical assistance. He has written to District Minister S.T. Somashekar in this regard and the meeting decided to wind up 16 such COVID Care Centres. 

The order to this effect was issued this morning by District Health Officer (DHO) Dr. T. Amarnath who said that all the 16 COVID Care Centres would be closed with immediate effect. 

Speaking to Star of Mysore, Dr. Amarnath said that these COVID Care Centres were not following the protocols issued by the Government and some of them do not have the basic facilities like sanitisation and hygiene. “Many of them do not have doctors as prescribed by the Government and no specialist visits the units. There are no support staff and cleaning personnel and basic medical infrastructure. The money for such COVID Care Centre is provided by the Government and there has to be some accountability,” he added.

The Mysuru District Administration will give the 16 COVID Care Centres one more chance to accumulate facilities, doctors and equipment. 

“We have formed a Committee to oversee the facilities and if the Committee gives a satisfactory report, then these centres will be restarted with several conditions. The Committee has already started inspection of the facilities provided  at all the COVID Care Centres,” the DHO added. 

MLA Ramdas reacts

MLA Ramdas told SOM that the 16 COVID Care Centres did not follow the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) laid down by the Government and the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR). 

“Myself and MUDA Chairman H.V. Rajeev, who heads the District-level Task Force on COVID Bed Management, wore PPE kits and visited a couple of COVID Care Centres yesterday and we found them lacking in facilities. Some have converted the hotels into money-making business activity where one floor is allotted to one hospital and the other floor is allotted to another hospital. The guidelines do not allow this and it is a clear violation,” he explained. 

“The COVID Care Centres have to reserve 50 percent of beds to Government quota as they get funding from the Government. This has not been done and many of them indulged in unfair practices like bed-blocking in some private hospitals,” he said.