GUWAHATI, May 23: The Centre will supply 160 metric tonnes (MT) of liquid medical oxygen every week to Assam to help the state meet the increasing demand of oxygen every day in the wake of the surge in COVID-19 cases.
The state on Sunday received 80 MT of oxygen via the Oxygen Express, the first of which arrived here from Jharkhand.
The Oxygen Express had left Tatanagar station at 5.55pm on Saturday, carrying four containers of oxygen, to arrive at the Inland Container Depot at Amingaon here close to noon on Sunday.
Formally receiving the Oxygen Express, Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, said this was for the first time that the central government has sent liquid medical oxygen to the state by the Oxygen Express.
“I thank Prime Minister Narendra Modi for allocating additional medical oxygen to the state through the Oxygen Express, which will greatly help in meeting the increasing oxygen requirements in the state, primarily for the treatment of COVID-19 patients,” he said.
The chief minister also thanked Union railway minister, Piyush Goyal for the timely initiative.
Speaking to reporters, the chief minister said that the Indian Railways would send two Oxygen Expresses to the state twice every week.
“From now on, the Oxygen Express will bring 160 MT of medical oxygen every week to the state which oxygen will also be supplied to other states of the Northeast such as Meghalaya, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Nagaland, Tripura and Mizoram after meeting the state’s requirements,” he said.
Oxygen Expresses have been delivering more than 800 MT of liquid medical oxygen across the country each day now.
So far, Indian Railways has delivered nearly 14500 MT of liquid medical oxygen in more than 884 tankers to various states across the country. As many as 224 Oxygen Expresses have completed their journey so far and brought relief to various states.
Sarma further said that Assam currently has oxygen storage facilities in all medical colleges apart from other government and private storage facilities. “We have about 800 litres of oxygen storage capacity in the state as of now,” he added.