The Private Hospitals and Nursing Homes’ Association (PHANA) on Sunday launched a portal — Search My Bed — which will provide real-time information on the availability of beds in private hospitals for the treatment of COVID-19 patients.
This has been a long-standing demand from citizens who were otherwise forced to call up private hospitals or knock on their doors to see if there were any beds available for patients.
Tzar Labs, a molecular diagnostic company in coordination with the Mumbai-based Epigeneres Biotechnology, has claimed to have developed a breakthrough blood test for early prognosis/diagnosis of cancer.
Texas Instruments on Saturday announced setting up of 86 critical care beds in a modular ICU unit at the Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Chest Diseases in Bengaluru. Given as part of the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiative, the ICU unit will come up at an investment of Rs 3 crore and will be ready in 3-4 weeks.
The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) is in the process of setting up a COVID-19 Care Dashboard and a data-driven analytical system in collaboration with ITC Infotech, a wholly-owned subsidiary of business conglomerate ITC Ltd.
The move is aimed at upgrading the local body’s existing pandemic care infrastructure and removing the multiple hurdles people have been facing in the chase for beds. The second wave has seen horror stories of people scrambling to find oxygenated beds.
Bengaluru-based Give India Foundation has come forward to donate 2,000 oxygen concentrators and the first batch of 80 concentrators was handed over to GKVK Covid Care Centre on Saturday.
Hospital coming up
A 250-bed COVID hospital will be set up in Yelahanka region immediately by Boeing company, manufacturers of Boeing jets, and the work has already been initiated. Boeing was also willing to set up another 250-bed COVID hospital in the same region.
An Indian expat at a UAE-based free zone firm has set aside producing Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) cylinders and shifted to manufacturing oxygen containers for India to help out the Covid patients in the country.
Speaking to Gulf News, Pushkar Khurana, Managing Director of the company EKC International FZE, said, “We are an Indian subsidiary and as soon as we came to know about the oxygen cylinder shortage in India, we had to rise to the call of our nation and serve the needs of our country.”
K.N. Kutty, sales manager of the company, a subsidiary of Everest Kanto Cylinder Limited in India, said the UAE unit has been producing CNG cylinders for Natural Gas Vehicles (NGV) as well as industrial cylinders since 2002.
With the COVID-19 second wave wreaking havoc in Karnataka and the existing curfew measures ineffective in containing the pandemic, the State Government on Friday decided to impose a total lockdown from 6 a.m. on May 10 to 6 a.m. on May 24.
The oxygen plant at the Visvesaraya Iron and Steel Plant in Bhadravati has become operational and efforts will be made to enhance production capacity of the plant, Minister for Industries Jagadish Shettar has said.
Karnataka Vikas Grameena Bank (KVGB) has bagged five top awards under various campaigns held for enrolment of Atal Pension Yojana (APY) from Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA).
Chairman, Karnataka Vikas Grameena Bank, P. Gopi Krishna, who received the five awards (Lead to Leap, APY Makers of Excellence, Game Changers, Leadership Capital and Amazing Achievers), has in a press release said that during the last financial year 2020-2021, the bank had enrolled 78,129 policies under PMJJBY, 94,658 policies under PMSBY and 68,961 accounts under APY.
The Union Minister of State for Ports, Shipping and Waterways, Mansukh Laxmanbhai Mandaviya, said on Wednesday that New Mangalore Port has received Indian Navy’s INS Talwar carrying 40 tonnes of liquid medical oxygen filled in cryogenic containers donated by the Kingdom of Bahrain.
“The New Mangalore Port is handling the oxygen cargo on priority basis,” he tweeted.