NE HEALTH BUREAU
AHMEDABAD, MARCH 30
The Apollo Hospitals Group on Monday announced ‘Project Stay I’, an initiative, to strengthen the bulwark against COVID-19 by creating isolation rooms in hotels with light medical supervision for quarantine and creating a barrier to ensure people recover without spreading the virus, and or be supervised so they can move to medical care at the right time.
This also ensures that people who don’t need hospital beds are not using scarce resources if they are not critically sick.
The objective is to create isolation and quarantine facilities away from the main hospitals in cities across the country and reduce the burden on hospitals providing acute care.
Apollo Hospitals has joined forces with Hindustan Unilever, State Bank of India, Oyo Rooms, Lemon Tree, Ginger hotels and Zomato to launch this.
These isolation rooms will be rolled out in Kolkata, Mumbai, going up by Hyderabad, Chennai, Mumbai, Kolkata, Bengaluru and Delhi, starting with approximately 500 in Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi, 50 rooms every three days, to reach an eventual target of 5000 rooms across the country.
The ramp up in the number of rooms will be calibrated as per the need. And cities will be added based on government requests, support of local healthcare providers and support for CSR.
The 5000 rooms will be pooled from Lemon Tree, Ginger, Oyo at a discount while Zomato will provide food delivery services. Medical supervision will be provided through telemedicine.
Dr. Sangita Reddy, Joint Managing Director, Apollo Hospitals Group said, “The steps taken by the Government of India in screening, testing and keeping high-risk individuals in state quarantine facilities to prevent the extensive spread of the disease is indeed commendable. However, with the increase in the scale and scope of testing, the number of positive cases is expected to increase. A significant number of these individuals will be positive but asymptomatic. There will also be a rise in the number of individuals requiring to be quarantined due to contact with COVID-19 patients. This will put a huge load on the government facilities for quarantine. This is the time for the private sector to step up to the challenge to aid, augment, and support our Government.”
Apollo claims that Project Stay I will not only reduce the load on the healthcare system by creating clean, comfortable isolation and quarantine facilities for individuals who have no need for active medical intervention but also provide a solution to such families.
The model is envisaged to have a combination of self-paying and CSR funded customers. The purpose of partnering with multiple facility brands is to ensure that all socio-economic segments of society have an equal opportunity to avail these services.
A guest who wishes to book a room under Stay-I needs to visit www.askapollo.com and fill out the form present on the homepage. Guests can also call Apollo’s 24/7 helpline number 18605000202 to avail this facility.
In both the scenarios after getting the details, the Apollo Hospitals team would get back to the guest with details of the booking confirmation and check-in requirements within 3 hours. Once checked into the facility, Apollo Hospitals would provide two virtual medical rounds every day, with a specialist being available round the clock on AskApollo / 24|7 platforms.
“The medications or the diagnostics prescribed during the rounds would be door delivered to the person’s room. Apollo Hospitals would put in place medical protocols and procedures for isolation as per the highest standards of excellence and ensure best practices are followed,” Apollo said in a statement.
Commenting on the development, Ritesh Agarwal, Founder & Group CEO, OYO Rooms said, “We want to work with state governments and private institutions to problem solve and assist in the fight against COVID-19. Our partnership with Apollo Hospitals has been developed to ensure we utilize capacity where possible to create highly sanitized pay per use quarantine facilities under the guidance and supervision of medical professionals.”
Gaurav Gupta, Co-Founder & COO, Zomato shared, “We are glad to team up with Apollo Hospitals and other service providers for “Project Stay I” and lend our services to make sure people in isolation have access to good food.”
