The North Delhi Mayor on June 29 visited the civic-run Hindu Rao Hospital and said the number of beds at the recently-converted dedicated COVID-19 facility will be increased to 200 in a phased manner.

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Initially, it is having 50 beds and gradually the facility will be expanded, he said. A senior official of the North Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC) which runs the hospital, the largest civic body-run facility here, said Prakash inspected the hospital to check the facilities available for novel coronavirus patients. He also inspected the helpdesk facility, COVID-19 sampling centre and coronavirus wards at the hospital. The senior official said, the COVID-19 facility has been started with 45 beds, and five ICU beds, besides 84 isolation beds. More are planned to be added as and when logistics and financial requirements are met, the official said.

During the inspection, the Leader of House in NDMC, the Standing Committee member, the NDMC Additional Commissioner, the Medical Superintendent and other officials were also present. He said the Hindu Rao Hospital has started functioning as a COVID-19 dedicated hospital. He said a help desk has been created in the hospital for the convenience of patients so that all information be available at one place.

The mayor said that initially 50 bed facility is available for COVID-19 patients, which will be increased to 200 beds in a phased manner. He interacted with doctors, nurses and paramedical staff of the hospital and said, "we all have to work together only then we can defeat coronavirus". The hospital was declared a dedicated COVID-19 facility on June 14.

Officials of the NDMC said the hospital's strength is 980 beds. "Out of these, 37 are unavailable due to a building being declared dangerous. Also, 111 of these are complement beds," the official had earlier said.

On June 29, when asked about the delay in converting the entire hospital into a dedicated facility, a senior official said, "When we mention a 'bed', it implies other services also like specialist doctors of that field, staff nurses, monitors, oxygen supply points among others. "These are supposed to be dedicated for COVID-only. Also structural requirements like separate donning-doffing areas, separate entry exit points, dedicated OT are to be catered to, the official added.

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