Photo Source: Babushahi Network
Sukhbir dedicates Covid Care center at Talwandi Sabo to people
Requests SGPC President to import vaccines to fill the gap in the supply of vaccines
Ashok Verma
Talwandi Sabo, May 8, 2021: Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) President Sukhbir Singh Badal today dedicated a fifty-bed Covid Care center established by the SGPC at Takht Damdama Sahib here which will provide health care facilities including oxygen and medicines to Covid patients to the people.
Disclosing this along with Shiromani Committee President Bibi Jagir Kaur, the SAD President said as many as 25 beds were equipped with Oxygen concentrators. He said the Centre would be manned by eight doctors and 24 nursing staff round the clock. “All facilities including oxygen, medicine, and food will be provided free of cost”.
Stating that such facilities were the need of the hour, Sukhbir Badal said the Punjab government should come forward to build such facilities in all blocks of the State as the pandemic had spread to the villages. He also advised Covid patients not to sit at home.
“The first few days are crucial. You must reach a Covid Centre or hospital to fight and win against this disease at the earliest stage and not wait for it to damage vital organs including lungs”.
Thanking the SGPC President as well as Guru Ram Das Institute Additional Secretary Dr. A P Singh for the initiative, the SAD President also appealed to Bibi Jagir Kaur to import vaccinations to fill the gap in the supply of vaccines to the State.
“We must ensure all our people are vaccinated. The central government has now allowed the import of vaccines. We must do our best for this humanitarian cause”, he said while also disclosing that the SGPC was also importing Oxygen concentrators.
Answering a question, Badal said it was unfortunate the State had been caught off guard by the second Covid wave despite ample warnings in this regard.
He said the Punjab government had failed to upgrade medical infrastructure and create much-needed ICU facilities.
“Even ventilators which were purchased from my MPLAD funds are lying unpacked”.
He also made it clear that this was not the time to politicize the issue and that everyone should work to fight the pandemic unitedly. “The government should however take pro-people measures including putting a cap on charges of private hospitals who were being accused of charging between Rs 2.5 lakh to Rs 5 lakh from Covid patients. The State can also subsidize or make Covid treatment entirely free in private hospitals during this time of health emergency”.
Badal also asserted that the Congress government should ensure decisions were taken as per ground conditions. He said it was extremely unfortunate that the government was closing down the Advanced Cancer Diagnostic Centre at Bathinda and turning it into a Covid hospital even though this was the lone facility available to cancer patients in the Malwa region. “Alternative facilities are available which should be used adding such bizarre decisions would cost even more lives”.
Speaking on the occasion, SGPC President Bibi Jagir Kaur said the Covid Care center would look after patients as long as level two treatment is required.
“In case the patient develops any complication he will be shifted free of cost in the Centre’s ventilator equipped ambulance to the necessary hospital”. Giving further details Bibi Jagir Kaur said at Alamgir, where a 25-bed center had been established a few days’ backs as many as 55 patients had availed of the facilities and forty had been discharged even as three serious patients were referred to hospitals. Senior leader Sikander Singh Maluka was also present on the occasion.EOM