SP Balasubrahmanyam extremely critical, says Hospital

Playback singer S P Balasubrahmanyam, who has been fighting with the COVID-19 disease for over a month and is on life support, is extremely critical, a hospital treating him said on Thursday.

The 74-year-old singer, popularly known as SPB was admitted to the MGM hospital with mild COVID-19 symptoms on August 5. The hospital said his health condition has deteriorated in the last 24 hours, warranting maximum life support and ‘extremely critical.

Assistant Director (Medical Services), MGM Healthcare, Dr Anuradha Baskaran said in a statement that he “remains on ECMO (extracorporeal membrane oxygenation) and other life support measures,” adding that a team of experts is monitoring his health conditions.

Balasubrahmanyam’s health deteriorated for the first time on August 13 and he was moved to the Intensive Care Unit and put on life support.

The health condition of the singer, who was admitted to the hospital with mild symptoms deteriorated for the first time on August 13 late night and he was put on life support and moved to the Intensive Care Unit. He was put on ECMO on August 19 besides a ventilator.

The 74-year-old singer underwent passive physiotherapy towards the end of August in which he participated actively. He was fully awake and responsive at that time, PTI reports.

On September 3, the hospital had said that he was stable, conscious, responsive, and continued to show clinical progress and days later it said his condition warranted an extended stay in the ICU requiring ECMO and ventilator support.

Balasubrahmanyam, who has to his credit over 40,000 songs, has sung in languages including Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, and Hindi.