CHENNAI: As the year draws to a close, the coronavirus remains the dominant force in the lives of people around the world, and in 2021 Tamil Nadu saw its investments in the public sector put to the severest of tests.
The year, which began with a gradual return to normalcy before Delta struck, ends with authorities on the alert as the highly-transmissible Omicron variant shows signs spreading throughout the community.
On March 18, 2021, TN reported less than 1,000 new Covid cases (989). Just two months later, with cases peaking at 36,184 on May 21, 2021, the State found itself short of beds, staff and oxygen. Patients flooded hospitals, long queues of ambulances outside government hospitals in Chennai, Salem and Coimbatore, oxygen saturation levels dipping. Since then, the State has doubled down on investment even as Delta’s devastation had experts wondering if TN had reached herd immunity.
Now as the immune-escape mutations of Omicron threaten to prolong the pandemic, officials are better prepared. According to State data, there are 1.15 lakh hospital beds ready to handle any Omicron-induced surge. Covid Care Centres will have another 50,000 beds. With the help of the Union government and various NGOs, 222 oxygen production units have been established in government hospitals. Through these, TN can produce an additional 244 metric tonnes of liquid oxygen per day. It can also now store1,731 metric tonnes. As many as 17,940 oxygen concentrators and 25,000 B and T cylinders are in stock. “Covid-19 continues to throw surprises. More research is needed,” said J Radhakrishnan, Health Secretary.
Officials said the State also had enough manpower. “We have 8,200 regular doctors, 6,000 house surgeons, 2,100 MBBS doctors (contract staff) and also multi-purpose workers. Apart from these TN has administered over eight crore doses of Covid-19 vaccines. These will help us in the coming year,” said Dr R Narayana Babu, Director of Medical Education.
Meanwhile, Dr T Selvavinayagam, Director of Public Health said, the department has to continue doing what it has been from the very start: testing, tracking and contact tracing, managing Covid-19 war rooms, maintaining data, and supplying consumables to the government RT PCR labs.
Dr P Paranthaman, Head of Medicine Department, Government Kilpauk Medical College Hospital, who has been treating Covid-19 patients from 2020, said doctors now knew what worked. “In the first wave, we didn’t have much information about the disease. We learnt it primarily affects the lungs and patients should be treated with anticoagulants and inflammatory drugs,” said Dr Paranthaman. “Now as doctors are experienced, we can start treatment immediately based on clinical presentation even if RT PCR test is negative,” he added.
He is of the view that as the coronavirus has mutated, its virulence reduced while transmissibility has increased. “In the coming year, fewer people will need hospitalisation, but those in need of hospitalisation will come in very sick as people continue to ignore the illness when it is mild,” said Dr Paranthaman.
Despite these advantages, TN’s weaknesses remain lagging vaccination rates and lack of meaningful change in public behaviour. While it initially ran into trouble accessing vaccine supplies, even now less than 60 per cent of the population is fully vaccinated. Meanwhile, experts are concerned at the limited behaviour change two years into the pandemic.
“People’s behaviour should change, everyone has lost someone to Covid. They should realise this before taking off their face masks. People tend to forget how they suffered in the second wave,” said Dr T N Ravishankar, founder of Sudar Hospitals, Chennai.