BMC to re-evaluate decision on curbs in January

Mumbai With Mumbai recording a steady rise in Covid cases for the past one week, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) on Tuesday said that during the first week of January, it will re-evaluate the restrictions that it has implemented ahead of the Christmas weekend.

Meanwhile, Suresh Kakani, additional municipal commissioner, said on Tuesday that the BMC will take a call immediately after January 1 on whether the restrictions would be extended or will be relaxed. Kakani said that the final call about the curbs will be taken after studying a few factors.

“For the next one week, we will be recording the overall growth rate in the city, the bed availability in all the hospitals, oxygen requirement and the percentage of patients that are getting hospitalised. We are not anticipating any stringent rules as of now, but we will only get clarity after studying the figures,” said Kakani.

He further added that from the last week of December to the first week of January, a lot of people come and go out of India. “The influx of more international patients during this period will also give us a fair idea about the trend of the virus because right now, the figures are only fluctuating,” he said.

Earlier this week, state minister of health Rajesh Tope had said that another lockdown will be imposed if the oxygen requirement in Maharashtra touches 800 Metric Tonnes (MT) per day. Kakani mentioned that the BMC is keeping a record of the day-to-day requirement of oxygen in BMC hospitals. He said that when the second wave was at its peak, the maximum oxygen requirement in Mumbai was around 210 MT per day.

“At present, the daily requirement is below 100 MT. As per the present infrastructure that we have, BMC is now equipped to fulfil a maximum requirement of 690 MT of oxygen per day and this could be extended up to 1,100 MT per day in case there is any adverse situation,” he said.

In the wake of the recent spike in cases in Mumbai and with the increasing number of patients infected with the Omicron variant, the BMC had announced new curbs on December 24.

In a circular issued by municipal commissioner Iqbal Singh Chahal, the BMC had banned new year celebrations and parties across the city and have also restricted gathering of more than five people between 9 pm and 6 am at public places. Besides this, the BMC also mandated only 50 per cent occupancy in all the restaurants, pubs and eateries.