Amid the fourth wave of the pandemic sweeping across the national capital, only 54 ICU beds were available for Covid-19 patients in Delhi as of Monday evening, according to government data.
Out of the 4,377 ICU beds for Covid-19 patients in government and private hospitals across the city, 4,323 were occupied around 8 pm on Monday, according to data from the city government's Delhi Corona application.
The development comes just hours after Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal announced a 6-day lockdown in the national capital. The lockdown will be effective from 10 pm on Monday till 5 am next Monday, said Kejriwal.
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However, despite the Delhi government taking many stringent measures to contain the spread of the virus, only two hospitals -- Sir Ganga Ram City Hospital and Madhukar Rainbow Children Hospital in Malviya Nagar-- have more than 10 ICU beds available. Of the 19,322 normal beds available for COVID patients, 3,288 are unoccupied, government data indicated.
Delhi recorded over 25,500 cases on Sunday, the highest single-day tally since the pandemic began.
The city has registered 1,46,934 cases in the last 10 days. The positivity rate has shot up from 7.79 per cent on April 9 to 29.74 per cent on April 18.
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Hospitals in the city are also grappling with shortage of oxygen supply and crucial drugs.
The government has been exploring options to set up COVID hospitals in schools and COVID care shelters in gated housing societies.
Meanwhile, in a related development the Delhi High Court Monday directed the Centre and AAP government to file affidavits by Tuesday disclosing hospital-wise availability of beds for Covid-19 patients here.
Taking stock of the current pandemic situation, the high court asked the Central government to look into the aspect of shortage of oxygen supply in Delhi hospitals on an urgent basis.
A bench of Justices Vipin Sanghi and Rekha Palli said the Centre and the Delhi government in their affidavits shall also give details as to how many hospital beds are with or without ventilators and oxygen support.
It also directed the firm, which used to supply oxygen to Delhi hospitals and has suddenly stopped, to restore the oxygen supply immediately. The high court was told that the firm was supplying oxygen to other states.
The bench also said that the Delhi government's direction on action against labs for not delivering Covid-19 test reports within 24 hours, shall not be implemented.
0n migrant workers crisis, it observed that both the Central and Delhi governments have failed in the last year's lockdown and lessons are required to be learnt from it.
The high court will take up the matter again on Tuesday.
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(With PTI inputs)
