Flurry of desperate calls from country for oxygen devices

NEW DELHI • Mr Raphael Koch, a retailer of medical devices in the small Swiss town of Wil, has been busy for the past two weeks fielding a flurry of phone calls. Most are from Indians or India-based companies looking for oxygen concentrators, with some even wanting as many as 500 at once.

But Mr Koch's Oxymed store barely has any stock left of the little-known machines that separate the critical gas from air and assist patients with low blood-oxygen levels. And he is not expecting fresh supplies from manufacturers until at least the middle of next month.

"They're desperate," he said, referring to the callers he has been speaking to lately. "They tell me about relatives dying on the streets, that there's no space in the hospitals and that the few oxygen concentrators that are still available are being sold for up to 10 times the normal price."

After a new coronavirus variant unleashed a brutal wave of infections in India, taking thousands of lives and sending millions to overcrowded and poorly equipped hospitals, demand has shot up for oxygen concentrators.

When healthcare facilities are running short of oxygen tanks and beds, the portable machines are increasingly becoming a line of defence for patients seeking to avert breathing difficulties while recuperating at home.

India has reported more than 300,000 daily Covid-19 infections for 22 consecutive days, highlighting the country's slide into the world's worst health crisis. Just as some countries needed ventilators in large quantities last year, India is now desperately seeking oxygen supplies.

The latest outbreak has seen oxygen requirements at Indian hospitals rise by 10 times, according to Dr Abhinav Mathur, founder of the Million Sparks Foundation, which is part of efforts around Delhi to import oxygen concentrators and donate them to healthcare facilities.

A small part of the surge in demand is being met by concentrators, Dr Mathur said.

Oxygen concentrators are useful only to those who do not require intensive care. The machines deliver about 5 litres to 10 litres of the gas per minute, typically at about 93 per cent purity, whereas those fighting Covid-19 in hospitals may need as much as 60 litres per minute, which can be delivered only by liquid-oxygen tanks.

India needs as many as 200,000 oxygen concentrators to meet the current demand, or five times pre-pandemic levels, Dr Mathur said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government on Monday said it distributed 6,738 of them from the pool of foreign aid it received in recent weeks, underscoring the inadequacy of supplies and donations trickling in from other countries, including the United States, China and Switzerland.

Distraught families are looking to source the gadgets - which could each set them back by as much as US$1,000 (S$1,340), or about half of India's per capita gross domestic product - from wherever they can. The cost is an additional burden for some Indians who face shrinking incomes after losing businesses and jobs to lockdowns.

"The next big worry is that the pandemic is clearly seen moving to semi-urban and rural areas," Dr Mathur said. "The government should start to plan for improving the availability of oxygen in these areas to be ready to respond."

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