Express News Service
BENGALURU: Air cannot be produced from hot air, or out of thin air. But a bit of solid groundwork always helps.A day after Industries Minister Jagadish Shettar and Health Minister Dr K Sudhakar met oxygen manufacturers in the state, requesting them to scale up oxygen supply, the latter have almost doubled their output and supply of medical oxygen and are now running at their “maximum” capacity, according to industry sources.
“The plants can further accelerate oxygen manufacture, but there is no infrastructure, not only in the state, but also in the rest of the country, to support the additional oxygen availability. There aren’t enough tankers, storage spaces, oxygenated beds, hospitals, health facilities and technicians to make use of inflated medical oxygen supply,” sources told TNIE.
Express News Service
BENGALURU: Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa and Chief Secretary P Ravi Kumar have written to the Central Government to increase the allocation of medical grade oxygen supply to the state after the Centre capped the quota to 300 metric tons of oxygen per day for Karnataka. This is much less than the present requirement, said sources in the know of the matter.
“There are seven liquid oxygen plants in Karnataka which, together, manufacture around 812 metric tons of oxygen per day. Out of this, the Centre has allocated only 300 tons to the state. The rest of the oxygen will be distributed to other states as per Central allocation. This is just not enough for the state, which is grappling with an acute shortage of oxygen.