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Tasikmalaya turns city hotel into COVID-19 emergency hospital
The majority of rooms will be turned into isolation rooms.
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Medical workers in protective gear and members of a joint team pick up a man who tested positive for COVID-19 to be taken to a hospital for isolation in the patient's neighborhood in Tasikmalaya, West Java, on May 15. (Kompas.com/Irwan Nugraha)
As COVID-19 cases in Tasikmalaya, West Java increase, Tasikmalaya acting mayor M. Yusuf has said the administration is turning a hotel in the city into a COVID-19 emergency hospital.
“We are almost done with preparations and will probably start operating tomorrow or the day after,” Yusuf said as quoted by kompas.com on Friday.
The Tasikmalaya administration decided to turn one of its hotels into an emergency hospital seeing that the Siliwangi State University (UNS) boarding house, which had been turned into an emergency hospital, was operating at capacity.
Furthermore, several hospitals in Tasikmalaya have also reported that their isolation rooms were overcrowded.
Yusuf said it had come to a point where 200 people were on the waiting list at hospitals each day. He also feared that such a situation would increase the risk of virus transmission.
“The hotel is located in a strategic area and operates under strict health protocols,” Yusuf said.
Read also: Data discrepancies explain virus surge in West Java
The acting mayor said many COVID-19 carriers underwent self-isolation in their homes. Nevertheless, such an approach carried risks as self-isolation, without complying with strict health protocols, would only create family virus clusters.
Yusuf went on to say that his team was arranging rooms in the hospital and setting up medical equipment, as stipulated in the COVID-19 health protocols.
The hotel consists of 60 rooms, including bathrooms in each unit. The majority of rooms will be turned into isolation rooms for patients, while the rest of the rooms will be used by on-duty health workers.
“There will be 30 health workers assigned to the isolation facility. They will work in shifts,” he added.
Aside from the hotels, Yusuf added that the administration was constructing type C and D hospitals set to be utilized as alternative COVID-19 emergency hospitals.
He went on to say that the National Disaster Mitigation (BNPB) would provide funding to run the emergency hospital.
“But we are currently using funding from a budget for unexpected expenses,” he said.
As of Friday, the Tasikmalaya Health Agency reported a total tally of 1,196 confirmed COVID-19 cases, of which 711 patients were still undergoing isolation, while 453 patients had recovered and 32 had died. (dpk)
Editor’s note: This article is part of a public campaign by the COVID-19 task force to raise people’s awareness about the pandemic.
