Vijayawada: The Andhra Pradesh government has constituted a state-level oxygen war room (SOWR ) and directed officials to constitute oxygen war rooms at district-level (DOWRs) also to facilitate uninterrupted supply of liquid medical oxygen (LMO) to the consuming points across the state.
Principal Secretary (Health) issued a Covid instant order-119 here on Saturday to constitute state and district-level oxygen war rooms and specified their responsibilities.
Accordingly, the state war room is responsible for monitoring the production, storage, transport, distribution, consumption and supply chain of LMO at the state level. It will function under the supervision of an IAS officer, S. Shan Mohan, under the overall guidance of Principal Secretary (Transport) M.T. Krishna Babu. It will have nodal officers from departments like industries, health, transport, revenue, disaster management, police and IT. Dedicated 24x7 helpline numbers will be set up to provide information to all the stakeholders and the public.
With regard to department-wise responsibilities, the industries department will coordinate the overall production and supply of LMO from source points as per the allocation order of the centre. It has also to ensure oxygen production capacity augmentation in the state. The health department has to compile and share information pertaining to oxygen beds, daily occupancy status, oxygen consumption and requirements from both government and private hospitals.
The transport department will shoulder the responsibility of getting more cryogenic vehicles for oxygen supply chain. It should also take responsibility for taking measures for airlifting, transport by rail, using ISO cryogenic tankers by rail for faster movement of LMO from production points to the state. The revenue department should allocate LMO vehicles to the districts. The police department will ensure unrestricted transport of LMO vehicles within and outside the state. The IT department shall provide technical support for implementing an ‘oxygen management module’ to give seamless access to SOWR and DOWRs.
The DOWRs will also be having nodal officers and responsibilities similar to those at SOWR. Several standard operating procedures are also stipulated for proper oxygen management.
