Agra: 22 Patients Allegedly Died In ‘Oxygen Mock Drill’, Probe Ordered

“We realised they would die. This was done for 5 minutes. They started turning blue,” the hospital director is heard saying in a purported clip.

A video purportedly of a Director of private hospital in UP’s Agra has gone viral on social media sites in which he’s heard claiming that several Covid patients died as a result of a mock exercise that allegedly cut off medical oxygen supply.

“We were told that even the Chief Minister cannot get oxygen, so start discharging patients. Modi Nagar is dry. We started counseling families. Some were willing to listen but the others said they would not leave. I said ok let’s do a mock drill. We will find out who will die and who will survive. So we did that at 7 am. A mock drill was done. No one knows. Then we identified 22 patients. We realised they would die. This was done for 5 minutes. They started turning blue,” Arinjay Jain, the owner of Paras Hospital, can be allegedly heard saying in the 1.5-minute audio clip from April 28.

#Agra : @myogioffice ji who is responsible for 22 #deaths?
Paras Hospital owner Dr Jain says that to deal with the increasing number of patients and oxygen shortage, he did a 5-minute oxygen mock drill. In such a situation, 22 patients out of 96 with serious condition died. pic.twitter.com/T1FqLKWxE5

— Mohammad Sartaj Alam (@SartajAlamIndia) June 7, 2021

Agra District Magistrate Prabhu N Singh, in a statement to the media, claimed there was no death due to lack of oxygen on that day the alleged video was recorded. However, he said a probe would be conducted.

“Initially, there was some panic and shortage but we sorted all that out in 48 hours. In this hospital, there have been seven Covid deaths on the 26th and 27th of April. The hospital also has a lot of other ICU beds. There is no truth that 22 people died but we will carry out an inquiry,” Mr Singh said in a statement.