OXYGEN SHORTAGE: INDIA BATTLES FOR ITS BREATH
. By a staff reporter
KOLKATA, 15th April, 2021: Amid the much harsher second wave of COVID infections, India has also been suffering from a shortage of medical oxygen. Many breathless Covid-19 patients have died due to the unavailability of medical oxygen.
The dire shortage has turned out to be a major challenge for hospitals in many states across the country. Oxygen therapy is crucial for severe Covid patients with hypoxemia- when oxygen levels in the blood are too low.
India was producing 7200 tonnes of oxygen a day and only 15% was required as medical oxygen in pre-Covid days. Now nearly 90% of this oxygen is being diverted for medical use. But there is no centralised coordination of oxygen supply and distribution. The country lacks enough transport and shortage capacity.
Moreover cryogenic tankers which are required for transporting liquid oxygen at very low temperature, are not sufficient. So the logistics of refilling them and bringing them to the hospitals is a severe bottleneck. This emergency has invoked black marketing of oxygen concentrators which is harassing the relatives of the patients.
According to the sources that total available production capacity of oxygen has been increased to 9,200 tonnes. India's largest producers of oxygen- INOX AIR products, Linde and Praxair, Tata Steel, JSW Steel, Reliance Industries, ITC have boosted their production of oxygen to meet the demand. India is also getting foreign aid from USA, UK, France, Saudi Arabia and Germany to alleviate the shortage. With the point to point green corridor "Oxygen Express" trains shuttling between most affected areas, and with Air-Force, Navy helping with the transport, the logistics issues are more or less resolved. The government has approved plans for more than 500 oxygen generation plants across the country to boot supplies.
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