Health sector resources about to get exhausted

Rawalpindi:The failure in implementing partial lockdown in the country including this region has already caused a rapid spread of coronavirus illness, COVID-19 among residents in the twin cities of Islamabad and Rawal­pindi taking the situation to a point where the health sector resources may not be able to handle the burden of consistently increasing number of confirmed patients of the disease in next few days.

It is obvious that the lockdown observed by majority of nations almost all across the globe was to slow down spread of coronavirus and not to eliminate it and the main purpose of slowing down spread was to save resources from getting exhausted, said a top official at the health department pleading anonymity.

He said the resources at the health department may not be able to deal with COVID-19 patients in next few days. Actually, the healthcare facilities designated for management of COVID-19 patients in Rawalpindi district have already reached saturation points and the hospitals have no space for mild to moderate cases of the disease.

The official said the heavy burden of patients with severe illness can be gauged by the fact that on Monday, there were 110 COVID-19 patients on oxygen support at Benazir Bhutto Hospital along with 19 patients on ventilator support. It is important that as many as 969 confirmed patients of COVID-19 have already been in isolation at their homes in the district and the number is on the rise with every passing day. With limited resources, how it would be possible for the teams of health department to collect samples of such a huge number of patients for repeat tests, said the official.

He added the teams have already been overburdened by the field work including contact tracing of patients testing positive. It is important that another 2,565 persons after being suspected as to be patients of the disease have been under home quarantine in the district.

The data collected by ‘The News’ on Monday reveals that COVID-19 claimed another three lives including one 46-year old male and two males having over 60 years of age in the district taking death toll from Rawalpindi to 112. The three patients belonging to Rawal Town, Kahuta and Kallar Syedan died here at Corona Management Centre at Rawalpindi Institute of Urology, according to the health department.

As many as 82 new patients have been tested positive for COVID-19 in the district in last 24 hours taking tally to 2,715. The number of patients so far discharged after treatment from healthcare facilities reached 1260 on Monday while 112 have so far lost their lives, said Executive District Officer (Health) Dr. Sohail Ahmed Chaudhary while talking to ‘The News’ on Monday.

He said a total of 373 confirmed patients have been undergoing treatment at the healthcare facilities in town while some 969 confirmed patients of the disease have been in isolation at their homes in the district.

In last 24 hours, the virus claimed another three lives in Islamabad Capital Territory taking death toll to 52 while another 350 patients have been tested positive for COVID-19 from the federal capital taking tally to 5329 of which 843 have so far recovered. On Monday, there were 4,434 active cases of coronavirus illness in the ICT according to the official figure released by the National Com­mand and Control Centre.