Here’s BMC’s procedure to get COVID-19 bed in Mumbai

BKC jmbo centre`s COVID ward monitoring room | Pic/Ankita Mishra

In a month during which the city broke all records, over 96,000 COVID-19 cases were recorded by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) in March, up from just 17,000 in February. The exponential rise has led to a shortage of beds to treat COVID-19 patients.

Municipal Commissioner Iqbal Singh Chahal said on Sunday morning that patients in the city were getting critical while waiting for their choice of medical facility for hospitalisation. He appealed to them to not do so and occupy a bed wherever available for immediate treatment, as abundant beds are available.

Here what you can do to book a COVID-19 bed:

Mid-day online spoke to Dr. Rajesh Dere, Dean of the BKC Jumbo COVID-care centre and he explained the civic body's procedure to book a bed.

He said, "Every ward office has a war room. These war rooms have COVID facility and occupancy related information of all centres, government or private. A citizen only needs to call the nearest war room and reveal the details. The war room will then contact the nearest centre and a bed will be made available as per the requirement of the patient."

He appealed to the citizens of Mumbai to not rush to the centres but call the war room and follow the subsequent process.

The BMC had earlier appealed, "We request all Mumbaikars to contact respective war rooms or 1916. We have enough beds vacant and no one needs to go through this chase."

BMC ward war room numbers (updated as on March 31)

(With inputs from mid-day correspondents)