Summary:
The Delhi government is adding ICU and oxygen beds on a war footing for sure but the availability of these beds and their triaging is still missing from the city's pandemic response with the official mobile application for Covid beds not serving its purpose. According to the official dashboard, there are a total of 22,801 hospital beds allocated to Covid-19 patients in Delhi, of which a little over 3,300 ward beds, 2,300 oxygen beds, and 56 ICU beds are vacant as of Monday night. In addition, a large number of hospitals did not have functioning phone numbers listed on the Delhi government's Covid bed dashboard. Moreover, even when hospitals do answer, most of them refuse to divulge information on bed availability unless the patient is brought into the emergency room. As a result, most patients have to take a gamble looking for hospital beds, step out — in the hopes that one of the hospitals on their way will admit them..