No shortage of beds, oxygen and medicines in Varanasi, assures CMO

Varanasi: While the COVID-19 mock drill was conducted across the country on Tuesday to assess the preparedness to tackle any spike in COVID cases, the chief medical officer of Varanasi Dr Sandeep Chowdhary has assured that there is no shortage of oxygen and beds in the district.

“There is full availability of medicines at all the health centres,” said the CMO and appealed to the local residents to strictly follow the COVID protocol and venture out only after wearing masks.

In order to assess the preparedness to counter the COVID infection in Varanasi, the mock drill was conducted at the 11 medical units including four community health centres, Pt Deen Dayal Upadhyay Hospital and Sir Sundar Lal Hospital of Banaras Hindu University on Tuesday.

The other medical units where the drill was conducted included the Trauma Center of BHU, ESIC Hospital, Homi Bhabha Cancer Hospital, Lahartara, Central Hospital of Banaras Locomotive Works, and Heritage Institute of Medical Science, Bhadwa.

“The mock drill was conducted in view of the apprehension of increasing infection of the new variant of COVID,” said the CMO, adding that proper coordination between the health teams was witnessed during the mock drill.

The district surveillance officer, Dr SS Kanaujia said that at present no person is corona infected in the district. But in view of the new variant, beds have been reserved for COVID patients, he said and added that the nodal officers have been deputed at the selected community health centre (CHCs).

The BLW spokesperson said that the mock drill was conducted at the COVID facility centre of the BLW Hospital, where the oxygen plant was examined. The oxygen generation plant was found in working condition with sufficient oxygen pressure and purity. Its maintenance record was found to be good.

The entire hospital is equipped with an oxygen pipeline and the oxygen pressure in the wards was found to be satisfactory. A detailed assessment of the infrastructure including available human resources, equipment, drugs and consumables was also carried out.