Sassoon says many ventilators from PM Cares fund non-functional, Mayor claims hospital kept them unused for too long

Of the 25 ventilators taken up for repair, Mayor Murlidhar Mohol said 21 have been made functional and eight of them have been brought to the ESI Hospital at Bibewadi.

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PMC has received 30 more ventilators from PM Cares fund, as announced by Union Minister Prakash Javadekar during the Covid-19 review meeting of the district a few days ago. (Representational)

The ruling BJP in the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) has claimed that many of the ventilators given to Sassoon Hospital from the PM Cares Fund last year had stopped working as the state government-run hospital kept them unused for too long even during the pandemic. Their allegation comes after the hospital administration pointed out that many of the ventilators didn’t work.

“The PMC has been trying to make available as many ventilators as possible for treatment of critical patients. However, Sassoon Hospital recently revealed that many of the ventilators of PM Cares Fund are non-functional. Thus, the civic body decided to look into it immediately and repair it. Most of them have been repaired in eight days but it is a serious issue to keep the ventilators unused for so long during a pandemic,” said Mayor Murlidhar Mohol.

Of the 25 ventilators taken up for repair, he said 21 have been made functional and eight of them have been brought to the ESI Hospital at Bibewadi. “The rest of the repaired ventilators would be used at various civic hospitals and Sassoon hospital,” Mohol said, adding that the city had received 80 ventilators from PM Cares fund and 34 of them were reportedly non-functional.

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“If Sassoon Hospital had operated the ventilators instead of keeping them unused, many lives could have been saved… there should be an inquiry into why the ventilators were kept unused for a long time,” he said. The Mayor also claimed that Sassoon Hospital was not increasing beds for treatment of Covid-19 patients despite demands made to them repeatedly.

Meanwhile, the PMC has received 30 more ventilators from PM Cares fund, as announced by Union Minister Prakash Javadekar during the Covid-19 review meeting of the district a few days ago. The Shankar Maharaj Math has also donated five ventilators to the civic body.

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Ajay Jadhav

Ajay Jadhav is an Assistant Editor with The Indian Express, Pune. He writes on Infrastructure, Politics, Civic issues, Sustainable Development and related stuff. He is a trekker and a sports enthusiast. Ajay has written research articles on the Conservancy staff that created a nationwide impact in framing policy to improve the condition of workers handling waste. Ajay has been consistently writing on politics and infrastructure. He brought to light the lack of basic infrastructure of school and hospital in the hometown of Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde even as two private helipads were developed by the leader who mostly commutes from Mumbai to Satara in helicopter. Ajay has been reporting on sustainable development initiatives that protects the environment while ensuring infrastructure development. ... Read More

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