At least 22 COVID-19 patients have died after an oxygen tanker leak outside a hospital in India, local media reports.
Video published by local media appears to show clouds of oxygen blasting from the tank outside Zakir Hussain Hospital in Nashik, a city in the western state of Maharashtra.
“As per current information, 22 people have died due to the interrupted supply of oxygen at the Zakir Hussain municipal hospital,” district collector Suraj Mandhare told NDTV
.Maharashtra Health Minister Rajesh Tope said the interrupted supply was the cause of death.”The leakage was spotted at the oxygen tank which was supplying oxygen to these patients,” Mr Tope said.
About 150 patients in the hospital were either oxygen-dependent or on ventilators, NDTV reported.
The major incident comes as India grapples with a surging second wave of coronavirus.Healthcare services across the country are close to collapse, unable to keep up with the relentless speed of the spread.
Ramanan Laxminarayan, director of the Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy in New Delhi said, Things are out of control,”.
“There’s no oxygen. A hospital bed is hard to find. It’s impossible to get a test. You have to wait over a week. And pretty much every system that could break down in the healthcare system has broken down,” he said.