Ventilator occupancy reaches 90pc in Lahore’s govt hospitals

LAHORE: The ventilator occupancy at Punjab government hospitals on Sunday has reached 90 per cent due to the increasing number of critical COVID patients, ARY News reported on Sunday.

As per the official figures, the bed occupancy situation in the intensive care and high dependency units of the public sector hospitals in Lahore was alarming. The people are finding it difficult in acquiring a ventilator at the eight hospitals of Punjab, allocated for the coronavirus patients.

The data shows out of 84 ventilators at Mayo Hospital, 81 are currently in use of critically ill patients. 32 ventilators allocated for the COVID critical patients at the Services Hospital are also occupied.

All the ventilators designated for the critical COVID patients at Kot Khawaja Saeed and Mian Nawaz Sharif (Yakki Gate), Jinnah, General hospital and Ganga Ram Hospital have been already occupied.

Punjab Health Minister Dr Yasmin Rashid has said that the more ventialtors are being provided to the government hospitals of the province to tackle the worsening situation.

Earlier today, as the country fought off with all its might the third wave of the global pandemic which was increasingly concerning the governments with mutated variants and increased infection incidence, the higher education authorities in Punjab had shut down colleges in at least 25 districts across the province.

With the deteriorating infection situation into the third wave of the pandemic, the department had decided to completely shut down all colleges falling in the remits of at least 25 districts.