West Bengal: Darjeeling health dept ramps up health infra to tackle COVID-19 third wave
Jun 27, 2021
By Tarak Sarkar
Siliguri (West-Bengal) [India], June 27 : Amid the possibility of a third COVID-19 after the emergence of the Delta Plus variant, the Darjeeling district health department is ramping up the healthcare infrastructure to combat the third wave, which may affect the children.
Dr Sandip Sengupta, Dean, Student Affairs, North Bengal Medical College (NBMC) said that elaborate arrangement had been made to increase the beds, especially at the pediatric ward.
"The administration has also prepared the first 28-bedded safe home for the children. Doctors appealed to the people to take Covid vaccines to fight against Covid-19 as they believe that this will help to reduce the number of Covid cases especially when the third wave is approaching," he said. 
Dr Soumendra Nath Pramanik, nodal officer, Safe home at Jesu Ashram set up by district health and family welfare department supported by CINI and Jesu Ashram said, the safe home especially prepared for women and child has 28 beds.
Few beds have oxygen support which will help a lot during the third wave, he said.
Meanwhile, the "Delta Plus" variant cases have been detected in some states including West Bengal.
The Viral Research and Diagnostic Laboratory (VRDL) at North Bengal Medical College and Hospital (NBMCH) has sent 15 COVID-19 positive samples to the National Institute of Biomedical Genomics(NIBMG) at Kalyani for the identification of strains.
According to the Darjeeling district officials, there are 158 COVID-19 positive cases are recorded in the past 24 hours.
