Peru arrests state hospital workers for charging COVID-19 patients $21,000 per bed

FILE PHOTO: People wait next to empty oxygen tanks to fill them up for patients suffering from the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), outside a private oxygen supplier, in Lima, Peru February 25, 2021. REUTERS/Sebastian Castaneda

LIMA (Reuters) - Peruvian police said on Wednesday they had dismantled an alleged criminal ring that had charged as much $21,000 per bed for seriously ill COVID-19 patients in a state-run hospital, aggravating care in a country hit by one of the world's deadliest outbreaks of the virus.

Authorities arrested nine people in an early morning raid on Wednesday, including the administrators of Lima's Guillermo Almenara Irigoyen public hospital, according to prosecutor Reynaldo Abia.