Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) or COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the lack of infrastructural facilities in the health sector in Anantapur district, which clubbed with the most inept strategies in managing the existing ones by the district administration, led to a situation where some people lost lives on the premises of the Government General Hospital here unable to get even oxygen supply support.
A large number of positive cases coming on a daily basis has also put extreme pressure on medical staff making it difficult to even conduct triage to discern if a person needs to go a hospital, COVID Care Centre or can remain in home isolation.
In a delayed reaction to the rising number of COVID-19 positive cases, the State government declared the Government General Hospital at Anantapur as exclusive COVID-19 Hospital with 700 beds on July 22, and also identified 23 other private hospitals for treating COVID patients.
Expansion of facilities
District Collector Gandham Chandrudu tells The Hindu in addition to the GGH, Anantapur and the Government Hospital, Hindupur, patients have been admitted to six private hospitals and those not needing oxygen or ventilator support shifted to five COVID Care Centres. As a backup, five more facilities have been readied.
"We have more than 2,000 hospital beds available which are sufficient for many more days," Mr. Chandrudu says and advises people not to panic. "People need to curtail their movements and go out only for essential work, to reduce the chances of getting infected from an unknown source," he adds.
As on Friday morning, there were 2,800 active COVID-19 positive cases in the district with 4,315 patients already discharged. Only 81 deaths were recorded so far out of 7,282 positive cases, which accounted for only 1.11% deaths and 52.25% discharge rate.
