The South Central Railway has appealed to local medicine suppliers and raised the production of medical equipment like sanitizers, masks, coveralls, gloves, and other personal protection equipment at their railway carriage workshop so that they can cater to the severe shortages of the medical equipment required to fight against COVID-19.
In Andhra Pradesh districts of Rajahmundry and Anakapelle and districts, Nizamabad and Kamareddy of Telangana are facing severe shortages of medical packaging material, masks, syrup cap, etc. They are craving to fulfill the settlement issues.
The SCR is operating parcel trains to meet the demand. Ch Rakesh, the chief of public relation officer of SCR, has stated that the parcel services are running from Secunderabad, Sanathnagar goods shed at Hyderabad, Karimnagar Khammam, and Nalgonda railway stations. Manufacturing units of essential goods including drugs, medical devices, pharmaceutical, their raw material, and intermediates are being supplied by these service trains.
He also said that a parcel van is loaded from Kacheguda to Nizamuddin in Delhi with 23 tonnes of bulk drugs and veterinary medicine, along with the special from Renigunta.
The material loaded included eight thousand face masks that have been supplied to the railway staff that are deployed on COVID-19 duties, as per the statement issued by the SCR. The inter-state parcel trains are running from Secunderabad to Kakinada town and Renigunta via Rajahmundry, Bhimavaram Town, Gudivada, Nidadavolu, Vijayawada and Kazipet among other destination. The parcel trains are also carrying other medical equipment supplies like goggles, respirators, face shields, gowns, and aprons.
From the carriage workshop, a source has stated that electronic equipment like air cooling machines, laser welding machines, coaching information systems and railway coach components are being supplied as their zone is planning to manufacture the ventilator machines. Even medical suppliers are pitching and are supplying ten to twenty kg of medical supplies each from the city, which was also reported by the railway officials.
The railway is running thirty-two special parcel trains from the twin cities to Delhi, Amritsar, Kolkata, Aurangabad, and Chandigarh to transport the medical equipment required at the cities to fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.