Private hospitals in Kolkata start scrapping Covid beds as admissions dip

Kolkata: At least two private hospitals in Kolkata have withdrawn their Covid beds for the second time this year. These hospitals had shut down their Covid units at the end of the third wave in February and revived them for a brief period during the surge in July-August.

AMRI has not had a Covid patient for a month and has no bed earmarked for Covid patients. Medica Superspecialty Hospital has no Covid bed either. Both plan to use isolation rooms if Covid patients get admitted.

“We can’t afford to reserve a ward or a unit for Covid since occupancy is high at all our three units. There has been no Covid admission for weeks and the positivity rate is almost nil. If a Covid patient has to be admitted now, we will use an isolation room,” said AMRI CEO Rupak Barua.

At Medica, too, the positivity rate has been almost zero. “We have not had a patient for a long time. Even those visiting our lab for a test have been testing negative. Till three months ago, we had four beds for Covid. But we have withdrawn all of them and plan to use an isolation room instead if we have a Covid patient,” said Medica chairperson Alok Roy.

RN Tagore International Institute of Cardiac Sciences has 20 Covid beds now but they plan to reduce it from next week. “All Covid beds are vacant and there have been no admissions over the last 10 days. We plan to reduce the beds to eight from the beginning of next week and will reduce it further in the days to come if the trend continues,” said Narayana Hospitals zonal head R Venkatesh. He added none has tested positive for Covid in the last week.

Woodlands has retained three Covid beds with a provision to increase the capacity at a short notice, if required. “We have no Covid patient admitted and the only one was discharged on Saturday. Our average Covid occupancy has been one patient for the last three weeks,” said Rupali Basu, MD & CEO of Woodlands.

Charnock Hospital has maintained a separate ward since it has been using a separate building for Covid patients since the onset of the pandemic. “We had not rolled it back even after the last spike in August. Now, we have 18 beds, though none is occupied,” said managing director Prashant Sharma.