Nisar Dharma
American aerospace major Boeing to donate high-end diagnostic equipment
J&K equipped to tackle a Covid wave even 3 times stronger than last one: Ranjan Thakur
Srinagar: Further strengthening J&K’S Covid-19 preparedness, the US-India Strategic Partnership Forum (USIPSF) has gifted 1500 Oxygen Concentrators worth Rs 10 crore to the Union Territory, the consignment of which is expected to reach Jammu in the next few days.
All of them, officials told The Kashmir Monitor, are high-flow concentrators that can go up to 10 litres per minute.
The consignment is leaving Delhi for J&K Sunday afternoon.
Principal Secretary Industries and Commerce, Ranjan Prakash Thakur, confirmed the development and said once received the concentrators will be used for patients in smaller locations where people don’t have easy access to larger hospitals.
The USISPF is a non-profit organization committed to creating a powerful strategic partnership between the U.S. and India.
In May, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, in partnership with the USISPF and U.S.-India Business Council, launched an alliance with 40 American companies to deliver critically-needed emergency Covid relief to India.
The public-private partnership provided India with critical medical supplies, vaccines, oxygen and other life-saving assistance amid an unprecedented surge in coronavirus cases.
The USISPF, Thakur added, is also donating 2,000 oxygen cylinders to J&K.
“There are people from Kashmiri origin, both pandits and Muslims, who are now part of this initiative and have made it possible,” he said.
Thakur said that J&K is also expecting to receive high-tech diagnostic equipment from American aerospace major Boeing.
He said that J&K was fully equipped to deal with “a Covid wave three to four times stronger than the second wave”.
“We are more than prepared. Even if the third wave, if it happens, is three to four times worse than the previous one, we will still be capable of handling it now. We are far better prepared,” he said.
About the DRDO hospitals established in both Kashmir and Jammu divisions, he said that though the patient rush has substantially decreased, the hospitals will stay for now.
“We are not manning them (DRDO hospitals) fully as there are not enough patients. We hope we don’t need more doctors but they will not be dismantled any time soon,” he said.
From around 5,000 cases and 50+ deaths a day in May, J&K Covid numbers have pleasantly shrunk to a few hundred and less than 10 deaths a day during the last fortnight.
Vaccination drives too have picked up pace in the last one month as the administration went into an overdrive to inoculate as many people as possible against the deadly virus.
According to an official statement released recently by the government, J&K has registered its highest vaccination number with over 1,14,000 doses administered across the UT in a single day with overall vaccination rate for 45 and above age group reaching 87 per cent.
Besides, 14 Districts, out of 20, are now under the Green Zone as per the five cardinal Indicators for assessing the COVID-19 situation, including weekly cases per million population, test positivity rate, bed occupancy, mortality and vaccination coverage.
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