Mumbai: In BMC vs social media row, no respite for COVID-19 patients

COVID positive patients needing a bed must call the ward war room mdash this was the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporationrsquos BMC message on social media recently in an attempt to make them follow protocols for COVID treatment However people are struggling to get beds despite repeated calls to the war rooms and thus are having to approach influencers and corporators through social media to get bedsCitizens have been told to wait for beds amid a shortage File picWith patients and their families facing uncertainties with regard to getting normal and ICU beds groups of citizens have been helping them out However the BMC claims that this parallel window for bed allotment is causing confusion and chaos and could create problems for those in need Social media is filled with people putting out information related to beds and other resources by taking the help of their contacts The civic body said that while the citizensrsquo initiatives are good deeds calling senior officials is not helping anyone and leading to confusionA tweet by BMC said ldquoOne big final request To individuals amp groups calling sr officials to persuade for a bed for someone they promised to help we too dial the War Room numbers for support We would not want to jump the queue amp disadvantage the ones who waited longer We are sure everyone agreesrdquoCivic officials said that there are enough beds and it is for the citizens to accept the beds they get and not insist on getting admitted to private hospitals or demand ICU beds However in a majority of cases where various Twitter groups have helped in terms of bed many people were in a desperate situation and could not wait for the BMC to get backKurla resident Zain Abbas said ldquoMy friendrsquos father was very serious and we were roaming in the ambulance with him as we did not get any response from the ward war room Directly approaching the hospital did not help either It was only after we reached out to a group of citizens helping patients that we managed to get an ICU bed after 13 hours of wait If the BMC could arrange it for us we could have got a senior citizen admitted much fasterrdquo An Andheri patientrsquos son who did not wish to be named said ldquoWe had called the K East ward war room on April 19 and wanted an ICU bed for my father as he was bedridden but not very critical with COVID However his condition deteriorated and till April 22 there was no bed available I had also asked BMC to help me get a bed in a private hospital but they said they donrsquot have the authority So we approached a group helping citizens and got an ICU bed right awayrdquolsquoAAP helped get ICU bedrsquoIn another instance Arun Suryanarayananrsquos parents were told by the ward war room to isolate but they faced trouble later Suryanarayanan said ldquoAt first my father had fever but his oxygen levels were okay Two days later his condition deteriorated and there was no help from the war room Through Twitter we managed to get him a bed at the Mulund Jumbo COVID Centre but even there his condition worsened and he had to be shifted to the ICU But there was no ICU bed available and we had to struggle again Then AAP members helped us with an ICU bedrdquoThe BMC has also asked citizens to not insist on ICU beds on calls itself as it is a doctorrsquos decision A BMC tweet said ldquoNevertheless in exceptional cases serious patients may approach BMCgovtpvt hospnursing homes for walkin bed with COVIDve report Hosp will assess medical condition amp then decide on admission but they will have to intimate local War Room to update the online bed dashboardrdquoAsking people to be patient amid rising cases the BMC said in case of issues with the war room people must complain to senior authorities However who the senior authorities are was not specified10hour waitA Malad resident Heena Shaikh had to wait nearly 10 hours for the war room to allot beds for her senior parents She said ldquoThe ward war room first told us to isolate at home as everyone in the family had tested positive Later they told me that because my father is comorbid and over 75 years old itrsquos better to admit him They said they will take time to get a bed as there was a shortage but they kept in touch and finally after almost 10 hours we got a bed My father is recovering nowrdquo13 HRTime a Kurla resident spent searching for a bed