AP draws up Rs 696.52 crore plan to ramp up hospital infrastructure to tackle Covid third wave

The Andhra Pradesh government has drawn up a Rs 696.52 crore plan to ramp up required critical infrastructure in its hospitals, with focus on paediatric care, to brace for a possible third wave of coronavirus disease.

Of the total, the Centre will grant Rs 417.91 crore under the Emergency Covid-19 Response Plan-2, while the state government will have to chip in the balance, official sources in the Medical and Health Department said.

As part of the plan, a dedicated paediatric care unit each will be set up in 14 district and 12 teaching hospitals across the state at a cost of Rs 101.14 crore.

A Paediatric Centre of Excellence will be established at a cost of Rs 5 crore at the Government Medical College in Vijayawada city.

The 176 rural primary health centres, 355 urban PHCs and 230 sub-centres each will be equipped with six-bedded (non-ICU) units while 20-bedded units will be set up each in 208 community health centres at a total cost of Rs 147.60 crore, the sources said.

Besides, each of the 28 sub-district hospitals in the state will be augmented with 40 ICU beds at a cost of Rs 188.72 crore, 20 per cent of which will be reserved for paediatric care.

Though the Centre, in its ECRP-2 guidelines, suggested establishment of 50 and 10-bedded field hospitals for Covid management, the state government has not proposed any such facility in view of the large network of hospitals available, the sources added.

The state government has identified a total of 62 hospitals for establishment of liquid medical oxygen facilities, based on a detailed gap analysis.

While work on 39 LMO plants has already been taken up with its own funds, the state has proposed another 23 under ECRP-2 at a cost of Rs 8.05 crore.

Under ECRP-2, the state has also decided to spend Rs 27 crore for implementing the Hospital Management Information System in 12 teaching, 14 district and 28 area hospitals.

The government is also earmarking Rs one crore per district (total 13) for procurement of Covid essential drugs and Rs 50 crore for conducting one crore RT-PCR tests in the coming days.PTI DBV BN BALA BN BALA