Mandya: The infrastructure in Government Hospitals  will be upgraded by increasing the number of ICU beds and establishing oxygen generation plants throughout the district, Deputy Chief Minister and State COVID-19 Ministerial Task Force Chairman Dr. C.N. Ashwathnarayan said here on Thursday.

He visited the Covid Ward at Mandya Institute of Medical Sciences (MIMS) by wearing a PPE kit. He also spoke to patients undergoing treatment about the facilities being provided to them and instructed the medical staff to work towards ensuring better medical care for the patients and provide a minimum of 50 internees for COVID management. 

The number of Covid Care Centres (CCCs) needs to be increased by 4 times than the existing number as it has been decided not to allow home isolation in rural and urban slums. District Administration should ensure mandatory admission of infected into the CCCs, he said. 

The Minister said there was a demand for increasing ICU beds in the district and this will be fulfilled at the earliest. MIMS authorities have been asked to improve the quality of care. Oxygen generation plants will be set up in Taluk Hospitals, Community Health Centres and PHCs with the objective of providing 18KL oxygen per day and MANMUL has come forward to set up an Oxygen generation plant. 

Further, he said, “Home survey and testing at the doorstep needs to be focused to identify and confirm the results of symptomatic cases. For this, each Village Panchayat should be provided with a vehicle  besides deploying ASHA and Anganwadi workers.” 

There are a few instances where RAT and RT-PCR tests show negative results even though persons have symptoms. Such cases need to be subjected to CT scan and district administration should ensure this test is done. All these tests are done free of cost in Government Hospitals, he noted.

He said that vaccine productions would be enhanced by August and expressed hope that the entire population would be vaccinated by coming December. 

K.C. Narayanagowda, Minister for Youth Empowerment and Sports, C.P. Umesh, President, Mandya DCC Bank, Deputy Commissioner S. Aswathi and others were present during the Minister’s visit.