As India’s Covid-19 crisis deepens with a near-collapse of the health infrastructure, and horror stories pouring in from all around the country of deaths due to lack of hospital beds, essential drugs, oxygen and so on, the Centre has frantically unveiled several belated steps that initially left the field open for the onset of the second wave of Covid-19.
While many of these steps would certainly help in the availability of essential drugs and life-saving oxygen, it’s not clear whether any of these measures could fructify in a way that could help in engaging the Covid in a decisive way.
For example, the Centre has given approval for the allocation of funds from PM CARES for installation of 551 dedicated Pressure Swing Adsorption (PSA) medical oxygen generation plants inside public health facilities in the country. The Prime Minister Office (PMO) also directed that these plants should be made operational as soon as possible as they will act as a major boost to oxygen availability at the district level.
Other steps include waiving all charges for ships carrying oxygen and related equipment, the exemption in customs duty, and the health cess for three months on import of medical oxygen and a slew of equipment related to production of the gas, exemption of health cess on vaccines to augment the essential drugs, medical oxygen, and Covid beds.
The Government was forced to initiate several of these belated measures after it faced massive criticism for its handling of the corona crisis.
With people dying in hospitals for want of oxygen and hospital beds out of the reach of even critical patients, the anger on the street was obliging.
In a statement on Sunday, the PMO said the proposed oxygen plants will be established in identified Government hospitals and the procurement will be done through the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. Oxygen is an important element used in the treatment of certain medical conditions which arise due to the Covid-19 infection.
While the steps would do little to provide succor to the victims of the second wave of corona, it would prepare the country to deal with the recurrence of similar situations in the future.
The Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways’ decision direct all major ports to accord the highest priority in the berthing sequence to the vessels carrying consignments of medical grade oxygen, oxygen tanks, oxygen bottles, portable oxygen generators and oxygen concentrators is yet another welcome initiative that could have come earlier.
These charges such as vessel-related charges and storage charges, that have been waived for three months and maybe extended further, are for medical grade oxygen, oxygen tanks, oxygen bottles, portable oxygen generators, oxygen concentrators, steel pipes for manufacturing oxygen cylinders and associated equipment.
To fast-track passage of imported oxygen and coronavirus-related medicines, the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC) has asked such importers to fill up a single-page online form giving a description of the goods and its end use, in case of difficulty faced by them in getting prompt customs clearance.
The Government has also exempted from custom duty and health cess to medical equipment and medical oxygens. Besides medical oxygen, the list of equipment on which basic customs duty and health cess has been exempted includes oxygen concentrator along with flow meter, regulator, connectors and tubing; vacuum pressure swing absorption (VPSA) and pressure swing absorption (PSA) oxygen plants, cryogenic oxygen air separation units (ASUs) producing liquid/gaseous oxygen; oxygen canister; oxygen filling systems; oxygen storage tanks, oxygen cylinders, including cryogenic cylinders and tanks; oxygen generators; ISO containers for shipping oxygen; cryogenic road transport tanks for oxygen; parts to be used in the manufacture of equipment for production, transportation, distribution, or storage of oxygen and any other device from which oxygen can be generated.
Customs duty and health cess exemption has also been provided for import of ventilators (capable of functioning as high-flow devices) with nasal cannula; compressors, including all accessories and tubing; humidifiers and viral filters; high flow nasal cannula device with all attachments; helmets for use with non-invasive ventilation; non-invasive ventilation oronasal masks for ICU ventilators; and non-invasive ventilation nasal masks for ICU ventilators.
All of these decisions will prepare the country to meet a future challenge, but these would do little to combat the deadly surge of corona which could peak out before these decisions began to fructify.