Reacting to the controversial statement by the Centre that no deaths were specifically reported due to lack of oxygen during the second wave, Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia stated there was an actual oxygen crisis during the second wave and the country had to endure it due to flawed policy of the union government.

“There was an actual shortage of oxygen during the second wave’s peak period of the pandemic. The central government has been running a cover-up since the very start of the pandemic. It is because of their flawed policy and implementation that the country had to endure an oxygen crisis during the toughest phase of the pandemic,” responded Sisodia on the query posed by The Statesman that if the Delhi government finds merit in the Centre’s admission about deaths caused by lack of oxygen.

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He further stated that the Delhi government wanted to probe the deaths reported by hospitals allegedly due to the oxygen shortage but the Centre stalled that initiative to hide its “fallacies”.

“The Delhi Government wanted to account for the reason behind deaths during the pandemic, we had constituted a ‘Death Audit Committee’ to work towards that. The central government however did not want their fallacies to be unveiled so they did not let us go through with the committee as they knew what truth will come out in the open,” Sisodia added.

The Union government informed the Rajya Sabha on Tuesday that state governments and Union Territories (UT) did not specifically report any deaths due to lack of oxygen during the second wave of Covid-19.

Responding to a question on whether a large number of COVID-19 patients died on roads and hospitals due to acute shortage of oxygen in the second wave, minister of state for health Bharati Praveen Pawar noted that health is a state subject and states and UTs regularly report the number of cases and deaths to the Centre.

“Detailed guidelines for reporting of deaths have been issued by the Union Health Ministry to all states and UTs.

The devastating second wave of infections in India, which peaked in April and May this year, saw India upwards of 400,000 cases in a single day. As cases spiralled out of control, the healthcare system collapsed. Apart from deaths due to lack of oxygen, there were also instances of people dying outside hospitals, waiting to be admitted.

At least 58 people died due to oxygen shortage in three Delhi based private hospitals in April, which were reported from Sir Ganga Ram Hospital Batra Hospital Jaipur Golden Hospital. The statements issued from these hospitals linked the shortage of oxygen supply to the deaths of their patients.

Dr SCL Gupta, Medical Director, Batra Hospital told The Statesman that politics should be kept away from acknowledging a human tragedy.

“If a death certificate doesn’t carry oxygen shortage as causation, it doesn’t mean that the person did not die due to its paucity. Medical intricacies can’t be used to make political scores. We lost our doctor during the crisis along with other patients,” he said.

Batra Hospital had reported deaths of 12 Covid-19 patients due to lack of oxygen. The deceased include one of the doctors who worked there.