Bengaluru: In light of the pandemic’s waning third wave, Health Minister K. Sudhakar announced on Wednesday February 9 that the government had withdrawn a rule requiring government and private hospitals to set aside 50 per cent of beds for Covid patients.
The decision came a day after the Private Hospitals and Nursing Homes Association urged the Chief Minister to release the beds set aside for Covid treatment, claiming that the beds were generally empty and becoming costly to the hospitals even as demand for non-Covid admission was rising.
On Wednesday, the test positivity rate in Bengaluru fell to 3.55 per cent. There were 5,339 new Covid cases recorded across the State, with 2,161 in Bengaluru. A total of 16,749 discharges were made. The number of active cases in Karnataka is 60,966.
