SURKHET: The Karnali Province government is all set to arrange budget of Rs 1 billion for the response, prevention, control and treatment of second wave of COVID-19.

In a press meet on Thursday, province government minister for social development Bimala KC shared that a budget of Rs 1 billion would be allocated to overcome the crisis of coronavirus pandemic and protect the lives of the people.

She further informed that an arrangement has been made to transfer Rs 500 million from capital budget to COVID Fund for immediate response.

Minster K, also the spokesperson of the province government, said Rs 220 million was immediately disbursed to the Province Hospital Surkhet and Rs 120 million was released to Charajahari community hospital, district hospital and strategic hospital for coronavirus control and health infrastructure improvement.

Arrangement has also been made to increase human resources and place antigen test and screening in four entry points of the province. As many as 8,302 people have so far tested positive for the coronavirus infection among 100,222 PCR tests done in the province.

Among them, 760 are found to have active cases of the infection while 39 have lost their lives to the deadly virus. Minister KC said that there are 1,950 isolation centers, 62 ICUs, 34 ventilators and 50 HDU beds at health facilities in local levels, province hospital, Karnali Academy of Health Sciences (KAHS) and district hospitals.

A mega oxygen plant has been brought into operation in KAHS and province hospital Surkhet to address the shortage of oxygen for the treatment of coronavirus infected people.

Budget of Rs 4 million each has been allocated for the setup of mini oxygen plan in all 10 districts of the province, she shared. Arrangement has been made to supply daily import of 150 cylinders from Nepalgunj if the province internal capacity is not adequate.