New Delhi: Indian Railways, on Monday, informed that 1,952 of its employees have succumbed to the Covid-19 pandemic since its outbreak in March 2020.
A top Railway official also informed that approximately 1000 railway personnel gets infected by Covid every day on average.
While addressing a press conference, CEO and Chairman Railway Board Suneet Sharma said, "This is a challenge. Railways is no different to any other state or territory. We are also having Covid cases because we are in the business of transportation and we need to run trains, to move freight commodities as well as passengers."
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He further added, "Approximately 1000 cases have been reported daily. Our employees are taking treatment in our hospitals and dispensaries. We have enhanced our facilities by providing oxygen beds and oxygen concentrators. We have also installed oxygen plants in several hospitals. We are making an effort to surmount these challenges to carry maximum traffic."
However, he clarified that it is a dynamic figure which varies every day and people are also getting well. Sharma said that within 12 to 15 days, these patients come back to join their duties again.
Concerning the Covid fatalities of the Railway employees, he said, "Yesterday when the figures were being reviewed, it was 1952 people who have died since the day Covid has started last year. This is a very tragic figure. But this is a difficult time for all of us and our main interest is to see that they are doing well. We are doing our best by increasing our ventilators, oxygen beds, and ensuring that they do not need to interact with too many people."
As per figures, 4000 beds are currently occupied by the Covid infected Railwaymen and their families.
Explaining about the relief work done by Indian Railways during the Covid-19 pandemic, Sharma said that Railways has transported nearly 4700 metric tonnes of liquid medical oxygen (LMO) in over 295 tankers to various states across the country since April 19 as 75 oxygen expresses have completed their journey so far.
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On Sunday, Oxygen Expresses marked a record by delivering 831 MT of LMO in a single day.
After the request made by Maharashtra Government, the fifth Oxygen Express to the state is currently on run for Nagpur.
First Oxygen Express to Karnataka has also started its journey from Tatanagar in Jharkhand and is on the way to Bengaluru with 120 MT of Oxygen.
So far, 293 MT of LMO has been offloaded in Maharashtra, 1334 MT in UP, 306 MT in MP, 598 MT in Haryana, 123 MT in Telangana, 40 MT in Rajasthan and 2011 MT in Delhi.
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