Battling Second Wave: Early Completion Of 162 Oxygen Plants, 100 New Plants Under PM Cares And Import Of 50,000 MT Oxygen

A meeting of Empowered Group-2 (EG2) was held on Thursday (15 April) to review the availability of essential medical equipment and oxygen amid increasing cases of Covid-19.

Pressure Swing Adsorption (PSA) plants manufacture oxygen and help hospitals become self-sufficient in their requirement for medical oxygen while also reducing the burden on the national grid for supply of medical oxygen.

Thus it was decided in the meeting of EG2 for early completion of 162 PSA plants sanctioned under the PM-Cares fund, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare said in a statement.

EG2 also directed the Health Ministry to identify another 100 hospitals in far flung locations for installation of PSA plants.

In view of increasing demand for medical oxygen, EG2 decided to float a tender for import of 50,000 MT of medical oxygen.

The Empowered Group directed the Ministry to finalise the tender for the same and also explore possible sources for import identified by the missions under Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).

Medical oxygen is a critical component in the treatment of Covid-19 affected patients. There has been increasing demand for medical oxygen, especially from the 12 states with high burden of active cases including Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, Chhattisgarh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan.

While the demand in Maharashtra is expected to exceed the available production capacity of the state, states like Madhya Pradesh do not have any production capacity to meet their demand for medical oxygen.