New Delhi: Union home minister Amit Shah and health minister Harsh Vardhan will meet Delhi Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal and Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal twice on Sunday to review the Covid-19 situation in the state, which added 2,134 new cases and recorded 57 deaths on Saturday.
The state government’s own expert panel will meet on Monday to discuss ways to augment the health care infrastructure, especially hospitals, and on Tuesday, the Delhi Disaster Management Authority will discuss the issue.
The spate of meetings comes against the backdrop of a spike in the number of cases in the state — Delhi has added 10,022 cases between Monday and Saturday, for a daily average of 1,670 — which ended Saturday with a total of 38,958 cases and 1,271 deaths. They also come as the state government is looking to aggressively increase the number of beds available for Covid-19 treatment, by attaching star hotels to hospitals and setting up facilities in large banquet halls.
On Sunday, the home minister and the health minister will hold two meetings with Baijal and Kejriwal.
Shah and Harsh Vardhan will meet the Delhi L-G and the CM along with members of the DDMA at 11am on Sunday, a statement from the home minister’s office said. The director of All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), Dr Randeep Guleria and other senior government officers will also be present at the meeting to be helmed by the home minister.
Shah and Vardhan will hold a second meeting at 5pm on Sunday to get a sense of what the municipal corporations are doing to fight the pandemic and help the government. This meeting will have the three mayors and commissioners of the East, North and South Delhi municipal corporations in attendance, apart from the CM, the L-G, Guleria and senior officials of the Union health and home ministries.
Shah’s call for the back-to-back meetings came three days after Kejriwal met him to discuss theCovid-19 situation in the capital. After the meeting, the CM tweeted: “He [Amit Shah] assured of all cooperation.
On Monday, the government’s expert panel will hold a meeting to review Delhi’s bed augmentation plan.
This will be followed by a high-level meeting of the Delhi Disaster Management Authority (DDMA), chaired by the L-G, on Tuesday, to discuss issues such as capping Covid treatment cost in private hospitals, reducing the current testing price of Rs 4,500, creating temporary mortuaries and crematoriums, and increasing the number of beds in the city.
According to the meeting notice, seen by HT, the June 16 meeting will also discuss the possibility of “using large blocks of vacant flats” for setting up makeshift Covid facilities. It also talks of preparing large scale makeshift hospitals with contactless treatment based on the Mumbai model.
On June 12, Hindustan Times, was the first to report that the Delhi government planned to convert its stadiums on the pattern of the NSCI Dome, in Mumbai’s Worli area.
Maharashtra cabinet minister Aaditya Thackeray, who is monitoring Mumbai’s Covid-19 bed augmentation plan, said that the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has so far operationalised about 15,000 beds at various field modular hospitals, mostly stadiums.
“Most of these field hospitals have contactless clinics, CCTV camera monitoring, remote sensing for patient parameters, and do-it-yourself processes for patients. These innovative measures have helped us operate these facilities with a thinly spread staff,” Thackeray added.
The creation of more drive-through Covid testing labs and provision of a 24×7 telemedicine facility by a panel of government and private doctors will also be discussed in Tuesday’s meeting.
Minutes after the agenda for the meeting was issued, chief minister Arvind Kejriwal released a video on social media urging doctors to chip in for the service. “I appeal to all doctors to volunteer for Delhi government’s Corona Telemedicine Helpline. Give a missed call now to 08047192219 to register. The people of Delhi need your support in this difficult hour.”
Tuesday’s meeting will also discuss how many medical personnel will have to be recruited to operationalise the augmented bed capacity of the city.
“Fixing price ceiling for treatment by private hospitals as some of them are charging exorbitant price and seeking huge advances. Fixing ceiling for charges of private ambulance services as some of them are charging huge price. Reducing prices being charged by private labs for Covid tests to make it affordable to general public… Send IEC [Information, Education, Communication] material on WhatsApp/SMS to all Covid positive persons/suspects immediately and periodically,” read the meeting notice issued on Saturday.
