The dark hour between 2 am and 6 am claimed eight more lives on Saturday due to oxygen fluctuations at Goa Medical College, taking the toll of Covid patients dead due to the oxygen crisis at the premier government hospital to 83 during the past five days. While the GMC doctors were reluctant to directly attribute the deaths to erratic oxygen supply, nurses, relatives of patients and volunteers confirmed that transitory dips in oxygen were noticed throughout the night.
“We cannot directly say that this is the reason (interruption in oxygen supply) why they died. Most of the patients die because of Covid pneumonia and oxygen is an important part of the treatment,” said GMC dean Dr S M Bandekar. A log of dips in the central oxygen pipeline maintained by GMC showed that 13 wards reported a drop in oxygen supply, with the longest drop being recorded in ward 143 for a duration of 90 minutes. However, the availability of oxygen cylinders helped prevent a higher number of casualties, said medical staff.
Critically ill patients sent to GMC
GMC dean Dr Bandekar said all critically ill Covid patients are referred to GMC and 160 of them are hooked on to ventilators. “But how to prove that interruptions have caused those deaths?” he said. Health minister Vishwajit Rane said the dip in oxygen supply could not be correlated with deaths. But on Tuesday last, Rane himself had said as many as 26 patients had died due to oxygen shortage.
He had said many more patients had died earlier too, and the high court should conduct a probe to find out why it was happening. The daily medical bulletin on Saturday said 58 Covid patients lost their lives over the past 24 hours with 33 of the deaths occurring at GMC itself. The deaths also took Goa’s Covid fatality count across the 2,000-mark, with doctors saying that this may still not be the peak of the second wave for Goa.
Goa’s positivity rate, which remains the highest among states in the country at 42%, only serves to back up the fears of the doctors. The Union territory of Puducherry, at 42.3%, is just a sliver above Goa. After a strong rebuke from the Goa bench of the Bombay high court, the state government appears to have finally grasped the severity of the situation and has rushed through the installation of a 23,000-litre liquid medical oxygen plant, which has been pushed into trial runs within 48 hours of work commencing.
On Wednesday last, hearing a slew of PILs on Covid management and oxygen crisis, a bench of Justices Mahesh Sonak and Nitin Sambre had directed the state government to ensure that no more lives were lost due to the oxygen crisis. Goa Forward Party, which is one of the petitioners before the high court, also continued to keep the pressure on the BJP government. “Midnight murders continue. Another eight Goans have lost their lives leaving Goa broken and in despair. This serial killing of Goans has to stop. The government of Goa and chief minister Pramod Sawant must answer for this disaster,” said GFP president Vijai Sardesai.
“The opposition can make tall claims, but I appeal to them to tell us if they have any suggestions to deal with the situation. This is not a simple situation to deal with,” said Rane.
