Thousands of unused ventilators gather dust across India as COVID bodies pile up [shocking details]

What can be worse than patients dying due to a lack of ventilators? As it turns out, the unavailability of ventilators is not really the worst thing. It is the stories of unused ventilators that are. Unfortunately, lying about in different numbers all across the country.

Even as the Government of India clarifies that no oxygen concentrators are lying pending at the customs warehouse, the constantly disturbing reports of unused, unopened ventilators lying in several parts of the country continue.

Of the 40,000 ventilators unused

In a recent communication, industry chamber FICCI had written to the Centre saying that most of the 40,000 ventilators manufactured under the PM Cares Fund last year have been lying unused at government facilities. When the country was in the grip of the first wave last year, the Centre had ordered 60,000 ventilators. As per a recent Times of India report, 10,000 of the last year's ventilators are yet to be unpacked, let alone used.

A situation that makes many in the nation wonder, whether we'll even be able to do justice to the ventilators shipped from across the world.

The figures in Bihar

Over 200 ventilators were allotted to the state of Bihar for various hospitals situated in 36 districts last March. More than a year after they were purchased, 30 ventilators have been lying unused in government hospitals at Nalanda, Siwan, Bhagalpur, Katihar, Saharsa and Buxar districts, as per a report by The New Indian Express. Reason? Due to lack of operators, they have not been made operational.

Some doctors on condition of anonymity also said that 177 new ventilators were lying unused in other districts as well. As per a few more specific numbers shared by hospital authorities on social media, as many as 26 ventilators lie unused at Bettiah government hospital in the Champaran district of Bihar.

The state of Rajasthan

While the situation remains pretty much similar in most states, only the numbers of unused ventilators vary. The issue, instead of being discussed to find solutions, has been a victim of party politics and blame game. As per a Dainik Bhaskar report, as many as 1500 ventilators have been received by the government of Rajasthan in the past 10 months and unfortunately, they were lying unopened and unused and only recently, 230 of them were found to be faulty.

After much time was lost in bickering over faulty ventilators, social media pressure led to the right steps being taken in their prompt installation.

Punjab, no different

Meanwhile, the political blame game continues. A few days back, Shiromani Akali Dal leader Prem Singh Chandumajra, while accusing Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh of not doing enough, demanded recruitment of medical staff and operators to run the ventilators. "What else can be said of the fact that ventilators that have arrived in the state have till date not bene installed?" he questioned the chief minister.

Ventilators across India

Last year, in June, when questions were being raised on the allocation of emergency relief fund, BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra had tweeted that at the time 47000 ventilators were available in public and private hospitals in India. He also claimed that because of the emergency and relief fund, in one go, 50,000 made-in-India ventilators were made available in the country.

Around the same time, the government officials also quoted an April 2020 study (done by researchers affiliated with the Washington-based Centre for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy) which said that at the time, 47,481 ventilators were available in hospitals in public and private sectors in India.

Same situation, different year

In September of 2020, the data released by the government pointed to a very similar situation of grossly unused ventilators. Of the more than 60,000 ventilators ordered by the central government, only 23,699 ventilators were installed in various designated hospitals across the country by that time.