From Our Special Correspondent
Daijiworld Media Network
Bengaluru, May 13: The lockdown or rather the strict curfew restrictions clamped by Karnataka since April 24 and the further stringent restrictions from May 10 across the state to control the surge in the Covid-19 pandemic’s second wave have started yielding results claimed chief minister B S Yediyurappa on Thursday.
Addressing a press conference in Bengaluru, he said the cases have come down from the peak of 50,112 cases on May 5, 2021, to 39,900 yesterday. In Bengaluru on May 5, the cases were 23,106 cases and have come down to 16,286 yesterday. In Bidar and Kalaburagi districts, which has seen an early peak, the number of cases and positivity is coming down faster.
The chief minister said the state government is preparing to procure 5 crore doses of vaccines for the age group of 18-44. The state has placed a purchase order for 3 crore doses of vaccines, of which 2 crore doses are of Covishield and 1 crore doses of Covaxin.
"We are floating global tenders for procuring an additional 2 crore doses of vaccines,’’ he said.
Yediyurappa said the Centre is supplying vaccines for people above 45 years of age as well as for the health workers and frontline workers. So far, 1.10 crore doses have been supplied by the Centre, of which 99.5 lac are Covishield vaccines and 10.9 lac Covaxin vaccines.
"So far, we have received 8.94 lac doses including 7.5 lac doses of Covishield and 1.44 lac doses of Covaxin vaccines,’’ he said.
"As many as 14.87 lac beneficiaries have completed 6 weeks after taking Covishield vaccine and are eligible for the second dose and 5.10 lac beneficiaries have completed 4 weeks after taking the first dose of Covaxin are eligible for the second dose. Thus, a total of 19.97 lac persons are eligible for the second dose as of today,’’ he explained.
The chief minister said it is necessary to complete the second dose as early as possible to give full protection to the people who have taken the first dose. Hence, the government has decided to utilize the entire stock available for the second dose of the eligible beneficiaries.
"The CoWin application also was found to have certain limitations on where one chooses to be vaccinated leading to chaos across centres. To better manage the vaccination process, we are coming up with a technology solution soon and will relaunch the vaccine programme for the 18-44 age group,’’ he said.
Prof Gagan Deep Kang is vaccination strategy advisor
The state government is appointing Prof Gagan Deep Kang, professor of microbiology, Christian Medical College, Vellore, as an advisor on vaccination strategy.
She is an internationally acclaimed expert and member of several advisory committees for the World Health Organisation (WHO), mainly related to research and the use of vaccines, Yediyurappa explained.
The state government has already distributed 3,000 oxygen concentrators across the state. Additional 7,000 concentrators both from the government and CSR Partners would be distributed, he said.
The chief minister said the Centre has allocated a quota of 3.01 lac of Remdesivir for the period from April 21 to May 9. The government has received the supply of 2.72 lac doses.
Notices have been issued to the companies who have defaulted in supplying their quota. Further, 2.74 lakh injections have been allotted for the period from May 10 to May 16. Action is being taken to monitor the supplies on a regular basis.
"We have also requested Government of India to allocate us the unutilized quota of other states as the demand of Remdesivir is more in Karnataka,’’ he said.
Yediyurappa said the state government has established a transparent system of collecting demand from private hospitals and coordinating supplies in a proportionate manner.
The state government of Karnataka is setting up a task force for the preparedness of the probable third wave of Covid-19 under the chairmanship of Dr Devi Prasad Shetty, chairman, Narayana Health.
Ramping up hospital infrastructure
The department of health and family welfare was having only 1,970 oxygenated beds, 444 ICUs and 610 ICUs with ventilators as of March last year. The infrastructure has been ramped up. Now, the department is having more than 24,000 oxygenated beds, 1,145 ICU beds, 2,058 ventilated beds and 1,248 beds with HFNCs.
Similarly, in the medical education department, the number of oxygen beds has increased from 4,700 to 9,405. The number of ventilated beds from 341 to 646 and the number of HFNCs from 15 to 570.
The action to ramp up the hospital infrastructure is still continuing. More ventilators, etc., are getting added in a regular manner. We have given about 200 ventilators to private hospitals.
"We are also giving subsidy to private medical college hospitals to increase the number of oxygen beds and set up oxygen generation units. The hospitals will get 70% subsidy from government and 30% will be spent by these institutions,’’ he said.
The state government is tackling the increased oxygen requirement through a 3-pronged strategy of increasing supply of Liquid Medical Oxygen (LMO), massive scaling of localized generation capacity through oxygen generators, large scale procurement of concentrators and cylinders.
The Government of India has increased the allocation of oxygen from 965 tonnes to 1,015 tonnes. We are lifting the entire allocation given to us from within the state and making efforts to bring as much as possible from the other states and in addition, we have received 40 tonnes of oxygen from Bahrain and another 100 tonnes from Kuwait. We have brought 120 tonnes of oxygen from Jamshedpur through a train.
Action is being taken to increase the oxygen generation capacity in the State which help us be prepared for a potential Third Wave. We are setting up 127 Oxygen Generation Units in the medical college hospitals, district and taluk hospitals.
For the convenience of citizens in home isolation, we are delighted two of our local organizations in Ola and GiveIndia are offering up to 1,000 oxygen concentrators on loan for patients in home isolation, free of cost. A similar mobile oxygen convenience service through OxyBus has been launched to enable quick mobile repurposing of oxygen need near government hospitals and triage centres.
To help reduce the stress on the need for oxygen in Districts and taluks across the state we are procuring up to 10,000 oxygen cylinders, We have already received 730 oxygen cylinders in the last 15-20 days. 380 have been given by the Government of India and 350 from foreign countries. These cylinders have been allocated to the needy districts, the chief minister explained.