Reza Mahmud :
Government has decided not to establish any more Covid-19 dedicated hospitals in the country due to scarcity of coronavirus infected patients, sources said.
Besides, the officials of the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) said that the specialized services by Covid hospitals would be stopped after observing two more weeks.
Sources said, the government has taken such decisions as number of beds in 28 government and non-government Covid dedicated hospitals have been remaining empty for long.
The health authority decided not to open the proposed 1500 beds Covid -19 hospital at the DNCC Market.
On the other hand, the public health experts said that the government should not stop specialized medical services in those hospitals when the infection rate is up to 22 percent.
They said, the government should scrutinize as to why the number of patients look with aversion at the hospitals though there are reports of huge number of coronavirus infected patients in the country.
Experts said in many cases, number of patients tried, but failed to get admission to hospitals due to non cooperation of officials.
When contacted, Professor Dr. M. Muzaherul Huq, former Advisor of World Health Organisation (WHO) told The New Nation, “This is too early to take such a decision. The infection rate is still high, even death rate.”
The right decision will be to increase tests to contain transmission before shutting down Covid-19 hospitals or to stop specialized medical services, he said.
The professor suggested also that the isolation centres and hospitals for severe COVID patients be kept opened until the contamination to be contained.
He says that patients have no trust in hospitals becauses mismanagement is found.
Aminul Islam, Director of Hospital department of DGHS said, the decision has been taken that no new Covid dedicated hospitals will be opened in case of thin number of patients.
“We will take final decision after observing the situation in next week,” Aminul Islam said.
Replying to a query about why huge number of beds are remaining empty when increasing number of patients are detected everyday, Professor Dr. Nasima Sultana, Additional Director General of the DGHS told The New Nation, “All of the patients need not hospitals. We have providing medical services over telephone number of infected persons how to be cured staying home.”
The DGHS official said that there are 14,945 general beds in Covid-19 dedicated hospitals, but 4361 only are servicing.
A total of 10,584 beds are blanks in those hospitals.
Besides, there are 394 Intensive Care Unit (ICU) beds in those hospitals while 168 beds are remaining empty.
There are total 15,339 general and ICU beds in coronavirus dedicated hospitals and among them 4587 beds are filled by admitted patients and 10,752 beds remain blanks.
She said that there are 6305 general beds in the corona dedicated hospitals in Dhaka city where 2199 patients are admitted and 106 beds are empty.
Besides, 108 patients are under special medical care in 142 ICU beds where 34 beds are blank in those hospitals, Dr. Sultana said.
In Chattogram, 313 coronavirus infected patients are there while 344 beds continually remaining empty.
Dr. Sultana said there are 39 ICU beds in the port city hospitals where 15 Covid patients are under special medical care while 24 ICU beds are empty.
