LONDON (UK) – Health Minister Matt Hancock said on Tuesday that there is no shortage of oxygen in the country to treat coronavirus patients, adding that some patients had to seek treatment in other hospitals when local stocks had been used up.
“The limitation is not the supply of oxygen itself, it is the ability to get the oxygen… through the physical oxygen supply systems within hospitals, and that essentially becomes a constraint on an individual hospital’s ability to take more COVID patients,” he told lawmakers.
“There is no constraint – that we are anywhere near – on the national availability of oxygen (or) oxygenated beds. It does mean … that sometimes we have to move patients to a different part – as local as possible – but occasionally across the country, to make sure they get the treatment that they need,” the minister added.