Health Ministry directs AIIMS & JIPMER Pondicherry to create isolation facility for suspected COVID-19 patients

New Delhi [India], Mar 8 (ANI): The Union health ministry has directed the authorities of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) and Jawaharlal Institute of Post Graduate Medical Education and Research (JIPMER), Pondicherry to establish isolation beds facility for suspected COVID-19 patients.

While AIIMS Delhi's Jai Prakash Trauma Centre has been asked to utilise the new emergency wing of the Trauma Centre by placing 20 isolation beds for suspected COVID19 patients. A separate entry gate has been designed to receive the patients from the ambulance.

Once the test results confirmed positive, the patient would be shifted to the National Cancer Institute, Jajjhar for the further treatment, officials said.

The health ministry has also directed the officials at NCI, Jajjhar to strengthen the isolation beds capacity from the existing 25 to 125 beds.

About 13 isolation beds would be added up by the Jawaharlal Institute of Post Graduate Medical Education and Research (JIPMER), Pondicherry and six other AIIMS have been directed expand the isolation bed capacity between 12-15 for coronavirus patients, which can be increased up to 30 beds if the need arises.

At a high-level meeting, Prime Minister Narendra Modi directed senior officials from the central government to identify sufficient locations for quarantine facilities for coronavirus patients. The meeting was attended by the union health minister Dr Harsh Vardhan.

India now has 39 confirmed coronavirus cases. Globally there have been over 3200 deaths due to the deadly virus.