All private Covid-19 beds to cost less now in Delhi

NEW DELHI: Offering major relief to the common man, Delhi Disaster Management Authority ordered a reduction in the rates of all Covid beds in private hospitals on Saturday. For an isolation bed in a private hospital, a patient was earlier required to pay Rs 24,000-25,000 per day, but this has been reduced to Rs 8,000-10,000. In the ICU with ventilator, which cost Rs 44,000-54,000, the rate has been lowered to Rs 15,000-18,000.

“In a meeting chaired by lieutenant governor, DDMA approved the recommendations of the high-level expert committee for fixing rates of hospital beds for Covid patients,” the LG’s Office said in a statement on Saturday. A Delhi government statement added, “The central government committee had limited the recommended rates to 60% of the beds reserved for Covid patients in private hospitals. But because Delhi government had asked private hospitals to reserve 40% of their beds for Covid patients, the 60% cap would have meant that only 24% of beds could be capped. The chief minister strongly presented a case to cap all such beds. After deliberations, it was unanimously decided to impose this cap on all reserved beds to benefit the common man and leave no scope for arbitrary over-charging.”
The rates fixed for private hospitals beds will be all inclusive as a package and will include cost of medical care for underlying co-morbidities conditions, supportive care and cost of medication thereof, for the duration of care for Covid-19. “This step will provide much needed relief to the people of Delhi with drastic reduction in treatment charges from the current charges of Rs 24000-25000, 34000-43000 & 44000-54000 respectively,” the LG’s office said.

The LG also directed the hospitals to follow the national guidelines on admission of Covid-19 patients and reiterated that the best clinical care should be provided to all patients. Baijal directed the health department to ensure adherence to quality care by the hospitals and laboratories as per the standards. Accordingly, the health department is going to put in place a system to get feedback and grievance redressal to strictly ensure implementation of the recommendations of the high-level expert committee.

Covid-19 testing has been ramped up in the capital too. A total of 25,754 tests were conducted on Friday, which included 13,074 RT-PCR tests and 12,680 rapid antigen tests. The government recently made Covid-19 tests affordable for the common man by fixing its price at Rs 2,400 instead of the earlier Rs 4,500. “The decision taken to reduce the rates charged by hospitals as per the recommendations of the committee will further help the common men in the fight against Covid,” the LG’s Office said in a statement.