By Rahul Sharma thru Quora-Heading changed as original heading created negative confusion-used here for educational purposes here as this is totally non commercial blog
All the ventilators provided under PM Care funds are of superior quality and have absolutely no issue. It's just that some states failed to even get them installed on time and when they were criticized for delay, they asked a doctor to call them defective.
After Covid-19 hit India last year, the Centre ordered 60,858 ventilators — sensing that there was a need to augment the numbers — of which 58,850 were made in India.
Under the PM Cares scheme 50,000 were procured, and 49,960 were allocated. Of these, 43,788 dispatched to state governments or medical facilities. This included nearly 12,000 ventilators supplied after April 7'2021.
Data accessed by India Today TV showed that of the 43,788 ventilators dispatched, only 38,803 were installed by April 6′ 2021. This means that about 5,000 ventilators which stand between life and death of a patient were or are yet to be installed.
Punjab's claims found false:
In the recent days, the Punjab government and medical institutes in the state have mounted a huge criticism of the quality of ventilators supplied under PM Cares scheme.
However, documents and chronology of events reveal another dimension to the crisis.
The first batch of 25 ventilators from the Centre reached Punjab government’s central store on October 8, 2020. By October 28, 2020, 75 more had reached the Punjab central store.
Health ministry sources say that the manufacturer of those 100 ventilators, Jyoti CNC, a Gujarat-based company confirmed that since October, several communications were sent to the Punjab government to find when the ventilators were to be installed. Sources say that during a video conference the Punjab government officials even bluntly claimed that they can be taken back and were not needed.
In April this year, Union health secretary wrote a letter to Punjab chief secretary Viny Mahajan asking the state to speed up the installation of 251 of the 809 ventilators supplied to the state saying that “non commissioning of the ventilators defeats the purpose” of fight against the pandemic.
Finally, nudged by the Centre, the Punjab government started allocating the ventilators after six months had lapsed since supply, and when the second surge was claiming victims.
It was on April 23 that the Punjab Health System Corporation or PHSC allocated 50 ventilators to the government medical college in Patiala, and the rest 50 to the government medical college in Amritsar.
In fact, Punjab’s Covid-19 response and procurement committee head Dr Raj Bahadur admitted that 50 of the ventilators supplied under PM Cares were lying non-functional and the college wad using its own 61 ventilators.
For installation of machines supplied in October 2020, the manufacturer was contacted in the last week of April this year.
When the manufacturer’s team reached to install the machines on April 29, they found that the hospital had no connectors for their piped oxygen gas system to link the machines.
Sources said It was the manufacturer of the ventilators who hunted the local market and developed the connectors to fit and install 30 of the machines. A Union health ministry official said, “Each hospital’s piped oxygen system has a specific connector and it’s the responsibility of the hospital to procure them. But in six months, the state government didn’t think of procuring the connectors.”
This was not all. The manufacturer also found that in most cases the oxygen pressure in the hospitals was not adequate to operate 50 odd ventilators installed (all supplied in October last year).
Audit findings :
The audit ordered by the prime minister has already started receiving a lot of data and information on how the ventilators were mismanaged. Records maintained by domestic manufacturers certified to supply ventilators narrate a story of indifference and unpreparedness on part of states to utilise the ventilators.
Many states didn’t have a plan which medical facility was to get the ventilators. So, states such as Punjab took charge of the ventilators, and stashed them on central stores for months.
In Firozabad in Uttar Pradesh, 65 ventilators were allocated to a medical college. They lay there for six months and now the college says it does not have the infrastructure to install them. It has told the state government to take them away.
In Maharashtra, Nashik municipal corporation Kailash Jadhav said the city medical facilities didn’t have connectors to fit the ventilators
In Supaul in Bihar, the ventilators reached the government hospitals, but the hospital authorities say they do not have staff to operate the machines.
Rajasthan, where the ventilators were considered to be non functional for govt use. But were in full functional order to be rented out to private hospitals who used them properly while govt hospitals had people dying without ventilators. After an expose they took it back but did not use it either.
In short, there is absolutely no problem with ventilators and the problem was getting them installed.
Also like all other electronic items, these ventilators come with manufacturers warranty and if there was a problem was some machines, problem could be fixed by manufacturer. However there are no problems reported to them whatsoever.
No wonder why Punjab has highest covid mortality rate in India, 2.38% compared to a national average of 1.11 percent.
Thanks for reading.
Rahul.
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