Assam to get 160 MT medical oxygen from Centre every week: Himanta
Amid increasing demand of medical oxygen every day in the wake of the COVID-19 surge, Assam is now set to get a supply of 160 metric tonnes (MT) of liquid medical oxygen every week via the Oxygen Express, the first of which arrived in the state around noon on Sunday.
The Oxygen Express had left Tatanagar station in Jharkhand at 5.55pm on Saturday carrying four containers with 80 MT of oxygen to arrive at the Inland Container Depot at Amingaon here.
Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, who was present during the arrival of the first Oxygen Express in Assam, said that this is for the first time that the central government has sent four tankers carrying 80 MT of liquid medical oxygen via Oxygen Express.
“I thank Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union railway minister Piyush Goyal for the initiative which will boost oxygen availability in the state at a critical time,” Sarma said.
Speaking to the media on Sunday, the Chief Minister said that the Indian Railways would send two Oxygen Expresses to the state twice every week.
“So Assam will get additional 160 MT of medical oxygen every week…this oxygen will be supplied to other states of the Northeast such as Meghalaya, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Nagaland, Tripura and Mizoram as well after meeting the state’s requirements primarily for treating critical COVID-19 patients in the hospitals,” he said.
Oxygen Expresses have been delivering over 800 MT of liquid medical oxygen across the country each day now.
So far, Indian Railways has delivered nearly 14500 MT of liquid medical oxygen in more than 884 tankers to various states across the country. 224 Oxygen Expresses have completed their journey so far and brought relief to various states.
Sarma further said that Assam currently has oxygen storage facilities in all medical colleges apart from other government and private storage facilities. “We have about 800 litres of oxygen storage capacity in the state as of now,” he added.
(Edited by Christopher Gatphoh)
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