Private hospitals are now worried about what to do with the designated Covid beds, most of which are lying vacant as the number of daily new cases has reduced significantly.
The hospitals fear there could soon be a crisis of beds for non-Covid patients because they are now turning up in numbers comparable with the pre-pandemic times.
Most hospitals have reduced the Covid bed count as the number of cases, which had rocketed during the Omicron-driven third wave in January, has come down sharply.
They said they wanted to reduce the bed count further but could not do away with Covid beds altogether.
Peerless Hospital has a 42-bed Covid ward but there were only six patients on Wednesday evening. On the other hand, more than 80 per cent of the 350-odd non-Covid beds were occupied on Wednesday.
“We are expecting the number of patients from Bangladesh to increase sharply from next month once restrictions are eased further. Then there could be a crisis of (non-Covid) beds,” said Sudipta Mitra, chief executive of Peerless Hospital.
He said the hospital would request the state government to allow them to keep Covid and non-Covid patients in the same ward but in different cabins.
AMRI Hospitals have 60 Covid beds in its three units in Dhakuria, Mukundapur and Salt Lake. Barely half of those had patients on Wednesday.
“We cannot completely do away with Covid beds but will reduce the numbers further in the next two to three months," said Rupak Barua, Group CEO, AMRI.
“The number of Covid beds will soon be reduced to 10 in each of the three units. After that, we will keep Covid beds in only one unit. If Covid patients turn up in the other two units, they will be taken to the third one,” said Barua.
Fortis Hospital, Anandapur, has 30 Covid beds and eight Covid patients on Wednesday.
“We intend to reduce the beds in a graded manner over the next two weeks with close monitoring of the patient load, keeping in mind that if we witness a spike in cases we are able to ramp up the Covid management services quickly,” said Pratyush Srivastava, zonal director, Fortis Hospital, Anandapur.
Several other hospitals, too, are planning to curtail the number of beds to the bare minimum.
The RN Tagore International Institute of Cardiac Sciences has 45 Covid beds. On Wednesday there were only 25 patients.
Officials at the hospital said the occupancy in the Covid ward was coming down every day. Only one or two patients were being admitted daily, compared with the 25-odd during the second wave in 2021.
“We are planning to reduce the Covid bed count in two phases. The numbers will first be brought down to 25 and then to 10 or 15,” said R. Venkatesh, regional director, east, Narayana Health, which runs the RN Tagore hospital.
He said a non-Covid ward could be carved out of the Covid ward, which will have a separate entry and exit and air-conditioning system.