Third wave or not, Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation area gets set for rising health service demand
NAVI MUMBAI, Nov 1 (The CONNECT) – Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation has expanded its pathological test capacity to 5,000 from the existing to 2,000 to meet any future challenges including the threat of COVID third wave.
The lab capacity has been augmented with the help of CSR funds from Siemens.
Thane district guardian minister Eknath Shinde, in the presence of MP Rajan Vichare, has dedicated the new facility to the people.
NMMC has also augmented the ICU beds at its Nerul and Airoli hospitals to 800 from 200 which should help make the civic health services much more efficient, Shinde noted.
NMMC commissioner Abhijit Bangar explained that the RT-PCR test lab at Nerul has been set up in record 11 days in August 2020 during the peak of the COVID wave. The staff didn’t take a single day off and conducted 6,36,073 tests. The tests, done free of cost, helped save Rs 38 crores for the people.
The minister felicitated the medical team led by nodal office er Dr Sangita Bansode a well as the Siemens senior manager Arjun Chavan.
Though the WHO declared COVID as a pandemic in March last year, Navi Mumbai did not have an RT-PCR lab of its own for long. Several local organisations, including NatConnect Foundation pressed for the facility as one had to wait minimum three days for the result to come from Mumbai.
Bangar, who took charge as the Commissioner in July last year, took up the RT-PCR lab case on priority.
The NMMC will be able to conduct tests for swine flu, leptospirosis, HIV and even cancer.
Navi Mumbai, planned by CIDCO, cuts into Thane and Raigad districts. The area under Thane district is governed by NMMC. The different areas of Raigad district part of Navi Mumbai are administered by Panvel Municipal Corporation, Uran Municipal Council and village panchayats.
