Hyderabad: With COVID-19 cases surging in the country and the city as well, private or corporate hospitals here are cashing in on the pandemic, thanks to the arrival of patients from the neighboring Maharashtra over the last week. According to sources from private hospitals, with Karnataka banning entry of people from other states, Hyderabad’s healthcare centres have become a preferred destination for well-off families.
A source from one of Hyderabad’s corporate hospitals said that about 20% of the patients in their hospitals are from Maharashtra. “Once a patient arrives in hospital, it is not considered which state he comes from. Full attention is paid to treat the patient,” the source added. These details are also apparently being provided to the state’s Health department.
Similarly, it has also been found that about 7 percent of patients in Hyderabad’s private hospitals are from the neighbouring state of Andhra Pradesh. Since there is no travel ban between AP and Karnataka, the majority of the AP patients go to Bengaluru for treatment. But due to a travel ban in Karnataka state for COVID-19 patients from Maharashtra, they are instead heading to Hyderabad in large numbers for their treatment.
In Telangana, the number of COVID-19 cases have been increasing over the last week or so. New cases which were below 100 for months, suddenly began to surge, with over 2000 cases being reported on Thursday alone. New cases have been steadily on the rise, and physical classes in schools have also been stopped due to the spike in cases.
In fact, on Thursday, chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao announced a financial aid of Rs 2,000 per month and 25 kilograms of rice to all teachers and non-teaching staff of private schools. Last year, many teachers from private schools suffered heavily due to non-payment of salaries as educational institutions were shut.
