ESIC hospital in Patna has 125 ventilators but nobody to operate them

Even as Covid cases have surged in Bihar in the first week of May, and there is apparently no bed available in the existing hospitals, two relatively new hospitals have both beds and equipment, ventilators and oxygen, are refusing admission to patients.

Nothing could be more ironical and heart rending as patients keep dying outside without oxygen and ventilators.

While the ESIC hospital under the central government has 375 ‘oxygen’ beds, only 150 of them are functional, the High Court was informed. It has 125 ICU beds with ventilators but not one is in operation. In both the cases the reason is the same. Doctors, para-medical staff and attendants are yet to be appointed. Ventilators but nobody to operate them is a familiar story everywhere in the state.

Curiously, 50 of these beds at the ESIC hospital (of the 150 which are functional) are actually being looked after by Army doctors from Danapur Cantonment’s Military Hospital. The remaining 100 beds are supposed to be manned by state government’s employees. But doctors are tight-lipped when asked if the beds are occupied or not. It is also not clear how and why two systems and two different to function in one hospital and what has been its impact.

Medanta in the heart of Patna is a spanking new hospital. The land initially allotted for a hospital to treat cancer and kidney patients which was to be named after Jai Prakash Narayan, was handed over to Medanta in 2015. While the hospital has been busy vaccinating people, it is informally believed to have expressed its inability to admit Covid patients till May 10. Chief Minister Nitish Kumar had justified the decision to lease the land to Medanta by claiming that the hospital would treat the poor. The lease agreement, it was said, specified that every year the Medanta Group would pay the Bihar government a sum of Rs. 3 crore. It is not clear when the arrangement was to be effective but since the hospital, although functional, has not yet been i n a u g u r a t e d formally, speculation is that the state government has not received a paisa till now.

It was the High Court which directed the state government to ensure that this hospital starts admitting patients. People are keeping their fingers crossed to see if admissions do start from Monday, May 10.