Stick to Covid price cap, Telangana tells private hospitals

Health Minister urges managements not to inflate medical bills and help government break surge in cases

Hyderabad: In the backdrop of surging Covid-19 infections across Telangana, the State government has on Saturday sought cooperation from private healthcare institutions to break the surge.

Health Minister Eatala Rajender, who held deliberations with private medical colleges and teaching hospitals, said private hospital managements had come forward to contribute to the battle against the virus.

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“We have told them clearly that they cannot inflate medical bills and that they have to follow the rates set by the State government last year. They are free to charge whatever rates they want from their VIP patients. However, patients referred by local district health officials will have to be treated at the rates that were set by us,” Rajender said.

There are close to 12,000 hospital beds under private teaching hospitals, corporate hospitals and healthcare facilities recognised by the National Accreditation Board for Hospitals and Healthcare Providers (NAPBH) in Telangana.

The Minister held talks with managements of private healthcare establishments on the role they could play to contain the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic. Rajender assured that if need be, private teaching hospitals, with an attached super specialty hospital, would be given assistance such as free medicines, oxygen cylinders, masks and other necessary equipment.

It was in June last year that the State government had announced a capping on prices of all services related to Covid-19 treatment. Accordingly, private hospitals can charge Rs 4,000 per day for isolation facilities from mild Covid-19 positive patients, Rs. 7,500 per day from positive patients who need Intensive Care Unit (ICU) facilities but not ventilator support, and Rs.9,000 per day from critical Covid-19 positive patients who need both ICU and ventilator support.
Stating that enforcement teams would conduct regular checks at private hospitals to ensure price caps prescribed by the government were being adhered to, the Minister also highlighted the need to follow Covid appropriate behaviour.

“There is no denying that the number of Covid-19 cases are rising. However, despite the rise, the severity of the infections is still less. Positive cases are recovering and fatality rate in Telangana is less. However, the public can’t take the virus lightly,” he said.

Rajender also pointed out that Telangana had good infrastructure when it came to RT-PCR tests. There were 60 private laboratories that could conduct at least 20,000 tests in a day while another 20 government laboratories can conduct at least 8,000 RT-PCR tests a day.

“We also have rapid tests giving us results within a few minutes. Our experience is that rapid tests have been very effective in containing Covid-19 in Telangana,” he added.

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