India Inc launches 600 hotel rooms as quarantine facilities

Indian industry has come forward to support the government in expanding the network of isolation facilities in the country that could support patients who need to be quarantined to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

Under the novel initiative that has brought together hospitals, hotel chains, commercial banks, food delivery service providers and FMCG companies, 600 rooms in Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Kolkata, Chennai, Mumbai and Delhi have been launched for isolation and quarantine of largely asymptomatic Covid-19 patients.

The plan is to take this up to 5000 rooms within the month so that an alternate quarantine facility is created especially to handle large numbers of Indian nationals being brought back to the country under government's Vande Bharat Mission.

The model is envisaged to have a combination of self-paying and CSR funded customers who need to be quarantined.

The initiative is part of a joint industry partnership - 'Project Stay I' announced last month. It has been worked out by industry body Ficci and Apollo Hospitals in collaboration with OYO, Fab Hotels, Lemon Tree & Ginger.

The project involves setting up of 5,000 isolation Rooms across multiple facilities in Hyderabad, Chennai, Mumbai, Bengaluru, New Delhi and Kolkata. These isolation rooms will house guests that need isolation and while Apollo Telemedicine Networking Foundation ensures remote medical service, SBI, Deutsche Bank and HUL will be the financial partners, and OYO, Lemon Tree & Ginger will be providing their facilities.

The project would also offer de-stressing experience for the healthcare workers as an innovative telemedicine solution has been devised to create a protected medical layer over the isolation rooms.

The purpose of partnering with multiple facility brands is to ensure that all socio-economic segments of society have an equal opportunity to avail these services.

A lead form will be made available on Apollo website for a customer and a confirmation for room will be shared within three hours (if available).

"In addition to Zomato being our F&B partner and HUL committing to supply PPE Kits, Sanitizers, Soaps and other Protective gear, a project of this magnitude or magnanimity will need several partners across the supply chain to come on board," Apollo Hospitals has said in its Project I mission statement.

The hotel rooms for quarantine would not only be available to people who are willing to pay, but certain category of rooms would be made available free of cost to those who cannot afford.

Country's largest bank SBI, Deutsche Bank and HUL have agreed to fund 50 per cent of category 1 rooms provided by Oyo so that it could be offered to people who cannot afford. All standard operating procedure developed by the government for quarantine centres would be followed by the hotels.

( With inputs from IANS )