New Delhi: Amid an acute shortage of medical oxygen in the national Capital, the Delhi government has set up a web portal to streamline distribution of the life-saving gas to coronavirus patients in home isolation, non-COVID hospitals, and nursing homes, an official order said on Wednesday. The portal — delhi.gov.in — will go live on May 6 and those requiring oxygen can apply with a valid photo id, Aadhar card details, COVID positive report and other documents like CT scan report if available, the order said. According to the order, district magistrates shall identify "dedicated dealers/depots to distribute such cylinders to individuals who shall not be redirected to refilling plants under any circumstances". "The district magistrates shall ensure that adequate number of office personnel are assigned to scrutinise all incoming applications and issue e-passes quickly as time is of essence in such cases, the order said. This may be accorded top priority. The DMs shall ensure that the dealers regularly get their cylinders refilled from the designated refilling plants," the order added. Based on the stock availability, the district magistrates will issue a pass having the date, time and address of the dealer/depot from where the oxygen cylinder can be issued/exchanged, it said. Before issuing the pass, the district magistrates must ensure that filled oxygen cylinder is available as per the pass issued, it added. The district magistrates will ensure that the distribution of lump sum allocation is done "judiciously and equitably between individuals, non-COVID hospitals, nursing homes, ambulances and SOS cylinders of COVID hospitals running on LMO (liquid medical oxygen)", the order said. The order said a provision of lump sum allocation of oxygen (to be given through cylinders) for individuals, non-COVID hospitals, nursing homes , ambulances and SOS cylinders of COVID hospitals running on LMO had already been made against re-fillers with each district being assigned a re-filler. "However, reports are being received of long queues at cylinder refilling plants also leading to public safety and public health hazard issues," it said. This portal has been created "to streamline the entire system of distribution of the lump-sum allocation under the supervision of district magistrates and also in order to facilitate the public to access these cylinders with certainty", the order said. The two medical oxygen plants have been installed at AIIMS and Ram Manohar Lohia hospital in the national Capital with PM-CARES fund and will start supplying oxygen to these medical facilities by Wednesday evening, the Union Health Ministry said on Wednesday. The plants were airlifted from Coimbatore in Tamil Nadu and installed here on Tuesday on a war footing, it said. Meanwhile, a common pool of oxygen cylinders is being created in every district by the Delhi government to supply the life-saving gas to COVID patients in home isolation and meet the emergency needs of the citys hospitals, officials said on Wednesday. In each district, a bus depot of Delhi Transport Corporation will serve as the hub that will be initially stocked with 20 oxygen cylinders, said a transport department order. Deputy Chairperson, Standing Committee Tulsi Joshi on Wednesday said that Oxygen Plants are being set up at SDMC-run Tilak Nagar Hospital and Kalkaji Hospital by the IGL company under CSR fund. She said that plants will be made operational by end of this month. Meanwhile, Bhagwan Mahaveer Hospital ran out of oxygen and issued an SOS call saying that it was in need of intervention. "Hospital is out of oxygen and the patients are arranging it for the last 5 days. But it has become very hard to find refills now. Please Help", the hospital said on Wednesday. As of late evening the hospital had oxygen supply that will last them for 4 hours, according to the Delhi governments dashboard. This was one of 10 hospitals, including Irene hospital in Kalkaji and Shanti Mukund Hospital, which had 4 hours or less of oxygen supply left. Holy Family hospital in Okhla, Max SS hospital Patparganj, HAHC hospital in Hamdard Nagar, Santom hospital in Prashant vihar among others had 5 hours or less of oxygen supply left. All of these facilities have raised several SOS calls due to oxygen shortage or erratic supply in the past few weeks and even lost patients lives for the same reasons. In fact, at least 7 hospitals, including GTB and Rajeev Gandhi Super Specialty hospitals, Indian Spinal Injury Centre and Madhukar Rainbow Childrens Hospital had only 2 hours of oxygen supply left as per the dashboard. Sanjay Gandhi Memorial Hospital was among 6 hospitals that had only 3 hours of oxygen supply left.

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