COVID-19 spike 3 jumbo hospitals to come up in Mumbai soon

    Mumbai, Apr 12 (PTI) In view of a sharp rise in
COVID-19 cases, the Maharashtra government has decided to set
up three jumbo field hospitals in Mumbai in the next five-six
weeks, city civic chief Iqbal Singh Chahal said on Monday.
    Each of these medical facilities will have a capacity
of 2,000 beds, including 200 ICU beds and 70 per cent oxygen
beds, and they will be set up at three different locations in
the city, Chahal told reporters.
    He said they have also requested certain 4-star and 5
-star hotels to create CCC2 facilities (COVID-19 care centres
for patients), which will be "dovetailed and run by
professionals from major private hospitals".
    The step has been taken to make more beds available
for the needy patients by shifting those who have recovered
substantially to the CCC2 facilities, which will be managed by
professional doctors, the BMC commissioner said.
    On Sunday, Mumbai reported 9,986 new cases of the
viral infection and 79 deaths, which took its caseload to
5,20,498 and death toll to 12,023.
    At present, there are 92,464 active COVID-19 cases in
Mumbai, as per official data.
    Chahal said the number of ICU beds in the city has
been increased to 2,466, with 325 new beds added in various
hospitals.
    As per the online bed allotment dashboard of the
Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), there are 19,151
beds in 141 hospitals here.
    Out of the 19,151 beds, 3,777 beds in dedicated
COVID-19 hospitals are currently vacant, Chahal said.
    The BMC will operationalise 1,100 additional beds,
including 125 ICU beds, in these medical facilities in the
next seven days, he said.
    The civic body has also decided to appoint nodal
officers for an accurate and more proactive functioning of the
24 ward war rooms and the jumbo field hospitals from 11 pm to
7 am, Chahal said.
    "The nodal officers shall function in two shifts -
from 3 pm to 11 pm and 11 pm to 7 am - both at the ward war
rooms and jumbo field hospitals," he said.
    All laboratories conducting COVID-19 testing here have
been instructed to give priority to swabs of symptomatic
patients collected from homes and follow the new time
schedules given to them, he added. PTI KK
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(This story has not been edited by THE WEEK and is auto-generated from PTI)