Team Herald
PANJIM: Reiterating his demand for restrictions to be imposed to contain the rise in COVID-19 cases ‘before it’s too late’, Health Minister Vishwajit Rane revealed on Monday that the beds dedicated for COVID patients in Goa are almost fully occupied.
Addressing media persons along with the State’s expert review committee on COVID, Rane said there are just 10-15 vacant beds at the South Goa District Hospital (SGDH) and Goa Medical College and Hospital (GMC). At present, SGDH has 200 beds while GMC has 150.
“On a daily basis, there are 30-40 new admissions in these hospitals. Right now there are 10 COVID-19 patients on trolleys at GMC,” said Rane while underlying how grave the situation is at the moment.
Pointing out that at present, there are over 2,100 active cases, Rane said immediate steps to increase the capacity of SGDH to 300, which he feels will be able to contain any further rise in cases in future.
However, he emphasised that it is important to impose restrictions at this stage given how cases have reached their peak in neighbouring States and that Goa cannot remain isolated and should ‘not be caught off guard’.
He said the Disaster Management Authority would be taking a decision within three-four days regarding imposing restrictions in the State in view of the exponential rise in cases. He added that he would be meeting the Chief Minister to pass on the suggestions of the committee.
He also claimed that the committee’s earlier suggestions were not rejected by the CM but that they were taken into consideration. He acknowledged that there has to be a balance between the rising COVID cases and the economic condition of the State.
Rane said the government is looking at bringing back earlier COVID Care centres and in this regard, has already started the procedure to requisition Shyama Prasad Mukherjee Stadium.
He stated that the ESI Hospital in Margao, which was the then COVID hospital, will now function as a COVID care centre and have two of its floors dedicated for COVID patients.
The minister said medical officers would be assigned to these COVID hospitals/facilities and added that the SGDH will have ICU and ITU facilities too.
Rane outlined the measures being taken to ramp up testing in the State, wherein new machines will be installed at GMC, SGDH and Asilo Hospital, Mapusa.
“The testing machine of Roche to be brought in the state, which will provide an open-source platform for testing kits that will conduct 2500-3000 tests per day,” he added.
Rane emphasised how increased testing will help the government assess and understand trends and look at what can be done.
“We shall be exploring possibilities for setting up a genomic analysis of the samples within the state with infrastructure worth Rs 1.5 crore, the particular study will ascertain the different variants of the virus present in Goa,” said Rane.
He said they are considering how to make the virology lab in the State functional in terms of getting in experts to run it and procuring the right equipment given that the National Institute of Virology (NIV) in Pune is taking time to send back reports.
He cited an example of how the State had sent 15 samples to NIV to analyse if it had any new COVID strain but it has been more than two weeks and they are still awaiting a reply from NIV.
He said there are already efforts to augment the type of testing at GMC such as, ‘D-Dimer’ and ‘IL-6’.
He added that the Health Department is monitoring international travellers visiting Goa and there was no death of any such traveller in the State.
Rane said international travellers need a COVID negative certificate while boarding a flight so that they are able to keep a check on that.
The minister urged people over the age of 45 to get themselves vaccinated and wondered why only in Goa, it is becoming a task to mobilise people for the vaccination drives given that there are queues of people to get vaccines in other States.
He clarified that GMC has not shut its vaccination centre but has shifted the premises as the earlier one, which was in a lecture hall, will shortly be used for examinations.
Rane expressed caution as to what will happen if the daily cases cross 300 in view of the existing infrastructure and added since the government has already learned from the experience of last year’s COVID peak, he hopes that the State implements necessary measures to contain the cases.
Rane mentioned that the State’s Health Department had attended the national video conference convened by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, where the Integrated Health Information Platform (IHIP) was launched, which is the next generation Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme (IDSP) digital platform.
