Coronavirus in India: West Bengal reports 14,281 new Covid-19 cases, highest one-day spike

An Oxygen Express train carrying around 30,000 litres of liquid medical oxygen arrived in Lucknow on Saturday morning as Uttar Pradesh battle a sudden surge in coronavirus cases, an official said. The railways on Wednesday had said it will run its second Oxygen Express to Uttar Pradesh after a request was received from the state government.

The chairman (board of management) of Sir Ganga Ram hospital, Dr D S Rana, said they were very sick and rebutted reports that their death had been caused due to a lack of oxygen. “I would not ascribe the deaths to oxygen shortage. A large number of patients admitted at our hospital are in a very serious condition and that’s why the high fatality,” Dr Rana told TOI. He, however, added that they were facing a severe oxygen shortage. “There have been occasions when we had to do manual ventilation -- intermittent manual compression of a gas-filled reservoir bag to force the gas into a patient's lungs -- to ensure that patients on ventilator support survive,” he said.

"Till now we've been able to save around 200 lives. "We request the DM and VK Singh ji to provide us with 25 oxygen cylinders for 12 hours which will help us save 1000 lives," said the gurdwara manager.