Bengaluru, Jul 16: Karnataka Medical Education Minister K Sudhakar on Thursday paid a surprise visit to the C V Raman Hospital in Bengaluru and urged the administration to follow COVID-19 guidelines properly. He also took stock of the hospital's preparedness to fight the deadly virus.
The minister noticed a number of flaws and warned the hospital to go strictly by the guidelines. He saw that despite 15 high-flow oxygen beds lay vacant, only two patients were admitted. He then asked the hospital to send asymptomatic and mildly symptomatic patients to COVID-19 care centres so that beds were available to those who need these.
"Doctors' profession is a noble one and in a situation like this everyone should perform their duty with utmost humanity and compassion. During this crisis, we should all be kind and empathetic," the minister said. He also ordered the suspension of two officials for not following the guidelines and not giving the right treatment to patients.
He noticed that the hospital lab collected less number of swabs and instructed them to collect a minimum of 500 swabs per day. Pointing out the under-utilised beds and ICUs, he observed that because of such negligence by officials, the government is being blamed despite working day and night for the past four-five months.
During this visit, the minister also interacted with the patients through video call and enquired about the services provided to them by the hospital.
"Surprise visits will continue. I will be in touch with every lab and get the right number of tests done on a daily basis," the minister said while speaking to the media.
He also urged the people who have recovered from COVID-19 to donate their plasma to save other lives, adding that donors will receive a reward of Rs 5000 as a token of appreciation.
Bengaluru, May 29: The hotel industry is one of the worst-hit industries due to lockdown, along with the tourism industry. Bengaluru's hotel industry has incurred a loss of around Rs 1200 crore during the lockdown period however, the hotels here are likely to open in June if the State government issues guidelines for the resumption of their services.
Speaking to media, PC Rao, President, Bangalore Hotelier's Association said, "It's not only the loss of business, but we have lost the customer base as well.
We don't expect any good future for the next six months. There will be a slow down in the business even after opening."
"We have requested our CM to give first preference to the hotels. We are going to restart our business in June if granted permission. Around 10 per cent of the hotels cannot open at all. They are in the stage of merging or closing down position. Few hotels may open after five or six months," he added.
He continued saying that many hotels are for sale but there are no buyers. There are around 21,000 restaurants in Bangalore, 3500 hotels with rooms and restaurant which has an average turnover of Rs 20 crores per day, Rao informed.
"We expect losses of around Rs 1200 crores in these two months. We are giving special online training to all the hoteliers and to our managers particularly to deal with the COVID-19 situation, including how to deal with the guests, employees, how to start the hotel services.
Each and every manager has already been trained and we are still continuing it. We will conduct face to face meeting as well and brief the managers," said Rao.
Belgaum, Jan 1: Police detained a group of around eight people who were allegedly trying to hoist 'Uttara Karnataka flag' in Hire Bagewadi area here on Wednesday.
This comes amid tensions between Karnataka and neighbouring Maharashtra over the border issue with protests on both sides, which have also led to the cancellation of bus services between the two states.
Protesters in Belagavi burnt an effigy of Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray, following which Shiv Sena workers had launched a protest near the Kolhapur bus stand on Sunday, and burnt an effigy of Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa.
The long-standing border dispute between the two states over is pending before the Supreme Court for several years.
On December 7, Thackeray had chaired a high-level meeting over the border dispute between two states. It was decided in the meeting that attempts will be made to get fast track hearing in Supreme Court on the issue.
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