DHAKA, 19 June 2021, (TON): A sexagenarian with comorbidity, including diabetes, Samad required high flow oxygen, which is available in Rangpur.

But he had to stay back in Thakurgaon as no bed at the Intensive Care Unit was available in Rangpur with his oxygen saturation dropping below 90, a worrying level, for the past four days.

Samad’s daughter Sharmin Samad said “he became quite feeble as he could not eat properly, also, he is not in a condition to travel to Dhaka for better treatment.”

According to the government data, 47 among the 93 samples tested in Thakurgaon came back positive, yielding a positivity rate of 50.53 percent.

Samad’s case is not different to the others, with the districts bordering India have been seeing a rapid surge in COVID-19 cases for quite a few days amid worries over the spread of a highly transmissible Delta variant of the coronavirus.

Although the authorities decided to provide more general bed facilities, district hospitals are yet to have enough ICUs for the COVID-19 patients, are still unprepared to combat a COVID-19 surge more than a year after the pandemic began.

According to the Directorate General of Health Services “as many as 37 out of the 64 districts in Bangladesh have no ICU facilities for the treatment of COVID-19 patients.”