5 die in Ranchi hospital after snag in oxygen supply

At least five critically ill Covid-19 patients admitted to Ranchi’s Sadar Hospital allegedly died after a snag developed in manifold room, leading to disruption in oxygen supply in the wee hours of Thursday. However, hospital authorities on Friday said the deaths occurred due to critical illness.

Following the incident, health minister Banna Gupta on Friday set up a probe into the matter.

“This is a grave issue. I discussed it with chief minister Hemant Soren. The health department’s principal secretary has been asked to conduct a detailed probe into the matter. Some technical snag could have developed in the system but it is important to find out if it was due to deliberate lapses on the part of staff on duty or someone else,” Gupta said.

According to available information, the technical snag occurred around 4.45 am due to leakage in MOX regulator in the manifold room. This led to a sudden disruption in the smooth supply of oxygen, as its flow dropped from 50 to 12 level.

It was alleged that soon after this, two critically ill patients, who were on ventilator support and high flow nasal cannula (HFNC), died. Three other patients also died in quick intervals even after the oxygen supply was restored within an hour through different manifold system.

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The sudden disruption in oxygen supply system led to chaos in hospital’s intensive care unit (ICU) where around 50 patients were surviving either on ventilators or HFNCs.

“The unit, however, had a jumbo oxygen cylinder but that could not be made functional. The oxygen flow level dipped to 12 from 50, causing much unease to patients. Attendants of many patients used small size cylinders attached with the beds for the time being but some patients didn’t have this facility too. Soon after, two-three patients died,” claimed a patient’s attendant.

Speaking to reporters on Friday, Ranchi’s in-charge civil surgeon Dr Vinod said, “Not a single death occurred due to disruption in oxygen supply. Those who died were critically ill. These deaths occurred at different points of time. The snag developed in the manifold system was rectified and oxygen supply was restored within half an hour.”

On Tuesday, as many as 17 covid-19 patients died in Ranchi’s Sadar Hospital at different points of time. These include 14 patients admitted in the ICU on the third floor of the hospital and three in Covid wards on fourth and fifth floors.

Jharkhand has reported an unprecedented surge in number of casualties in the last six weeks. While the state registered a total of 1,113 Covid-19 deaths since the beginning of the pandemic till March 31 this year, it added another 2,366 between April 1 and May 6.