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Remote Covid ward in Chhattisgarh tells new story of death
Bemetara's numbers capture in a nutshell the impact of the second wave of the pandemic in the state. And its lone Covid ICU facility — 8 beds at the district hospital — the damage and despair that it has caused.
In October last year, when the Covid caseload was peaking across the country, Bemetara in Chhattisgarh recorded 1,000 cases. On April 1 this year, the district’s log of active cases showed 6,300. By April 12, it had surged to 9,700.
Bemetara’s numbers capture in a nutshell the impact of the second wave of the pandemic in the state. And its lone Covid ICU facility — 8 beds at the district hospital — the damage and despair that it has caused.
Two of those ICU beds are vacant now. But that’s because the occupants succumbed to the virus on Monday.
Chhattisgarh currently has 98,856 active cases. “In Bemetara, we are getting more than 200 cases in a day. They are coming from everywhere,” says a district health official.
“The patients have all shown a similar pattern. Because of months of lull, they thought Covid was over. Even after they started showing symptoms, they thought it was common flu and didn’t turn up at the hospital until the last minute,” says a senior doctor at the district hospital.
The panic is evident on the face of 27-year-old Rupesh Sahu outside the Exclusive Covid Care Center. He stops anyone who steps out wearing a PPE kit to ask about his mother Renuka, 47, who was admitted to the ICU on April 5, just three days after she took a Covid test.
“She had gone to Durg to see my sister who had delivered a baby. I told her not to go inside the hospital, but she fought with me and went. She is the only one who got infected…my sister and her baby are fine,” says Sahu who hails from Bhendani village.
Renuka’s chest x-ray report shows extensive congestion, which is a sign of advanced infection.
According to the district’s Medical Health Officer, Dr Satish Sharma, there is a rising influx of cases from neighbouring districts. “Durg and Raipur are two districts where a high number of cases are being noticed. Bemetara, being at a junction of sorts between the two, sees a lot of intermingling across the borders. People from here also work in those two districts, and are now returning,” says Sharma.
In October last year, when the Covid caseload was peaking across the country, Bemetara in Chhattisgarh recorded 1,000 cases. On April 1 this year, the district’s log of active cases showed 6,300. By April 12, it had surged to 9,700.
Bemetara’s numbers capture in a nutshell the impact of the second wave of the pandemic in the state. And its lone Covid ICU facility — 8 beds at the district hospital — the damage and despair that it has caused.
Two of those ICU beds are vacant now. But that’s because the occupants succumbed to the virus on Monday.
Chhattisgarh currently has 98,856 active cases. “In Bemetara, we are getting more than 200 cases in a day. They are coming from everywhere,” says a district health official.
“The patients have all shown a similar pattern. Because of months of lull, they thought Covid was over. Even after they started showing symptoms, they thought it was common flu and didn’t turn up at the hospital until the last minute,” says a senior doctor at the district hospital.
The panic is evident on the face of 27-year-old Rupesh Sahu outside the Exclusive Covid Care Center. He stops anyone who steps out wearing a PPE kit to ask about his mother Renuka, 47, who was admitted to the ICU on April 5, just three days after she took a Covid test.
“She had gone to Durg to see my sister who had delivered a baby. I told her not to go inside the hospital, but she fought with me and went. She is the only one who got infected…my sister and her baby are fine,” says Sahu who hails from Bhendani village.
Renuka’s chest x-ray report shows extensive congestion, which is a sign of advanced infection.
According to the district’s Medical Health Officer, Dr Satish Sharma, there is a rising influx of cases from neighbouring districts. “Durg and Raipur are two districts where a high number of cases are being noticed. Bemetara, being at a junction of sorts between the two, sees a lot of intermingling across the borders. People from here also work in those two districts, and are now returning,” says Sharma.