Three Covid-19 patients died at general coronavirus ward allegedly at Marwari Relief Society Hospital (MRSH) in a span of 24 hours as there was no vacancy in the intensive care unit (ICU) of the hospital. An acute shortage in availability of beds including ICUs in numerous government and private hospitals coupled with sharp spike in Covid-19 cases have resulted in patients succumbing at home after being denied admission in hospitals.
At MRSH three Covid-19 patients were found dead in the general Covid ward since last night. Other Covid-19 patients in the ward were miffed after they were served breakfast and lunch by the hospital authority as, they alleged, the authorities didn’t remove the bodies untill this afternoon. The aggrieved patients refused food.
Apart from shortage of beds, beneficiaries seeking vaccinations at different Covid19 immunisation centres had a harrowing day today because of acute crisis in supply of vaccines. People were seen waiting in long queues at vaccination centres at different government and private hospitals in Kolkata and districts like Howrah, North 24 Parganas, Murshidabad, Malda, Jalpaiguri and Burdwan (east) districts today.
Most of the centres are facing acute shortage of either Covishield or Covaxin doses. At SSKM Hospital, around 1,000 people were waiting outside the Academic Building vaccination centres. The same happened at Salt Lake, Howrah town and Murshidabad. AMRI Hospital, Dhakuria also had vast numbers waiting for the jab. The hospital today put up a notice saying, ‘Covaxin was not available’.