The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has proposed hospitals in the city to follow a nine-point procedure under its new ‘Save Lives Strategy’ aimed to cut the COVID-19 death rate. Authorities noted that a large percentage of the deaths occur as patients remove oxygen to use the toilets primarily between 1 AM to 5 AM.
To counter this, the BMC has asked its hospitals to provide each patient with a bed-pan, while also making it compulsory for senior and junior doctors to conduct meetings with patients at least twice a day, though this can also be done via video conferencing or a phone call.
Additionally, the head of each hospital unit is tasked with keeping an eye on the functioning of the patients round the clock. Hospitals are also required to conduct a detailed audit of each COVID-19 death.
These decisions were taken in a meeting between Municipal Commissioner of the BMC, Iqbal Singh Chahal as well as civic hospital officials. Recent data has revealed that the COVID-19 mortality rate has gone up from 3 per cent to 5.66 per cent as officials added several additional deaths to the total tally that were previously considered non-COVID deaths.
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Previously, Chahal has asked hospitals to keep at least a month’s stock of Remdesivir and off-label tocilizumab, considered to be two of the most effective drugs in treating COVID-19 among critical patients.
The ICMR has approved the use of Remdesivir and Tocilizumab for COVID-19 treatment, while India has already permitted convalescent plasma therapy on a small group of patients. On the state level, Maharashtra launched ‘Project Platina’ aimed at increasing plasma therapy on approved patients and providing adequate data on its feasibility.
Early reports indicate that convalescent plasma therapy has proven to be helpful in combating the virus among critical patients.
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