A Collapsing Indian Healthcare System Needs Help

India is currently battling a second wave of COVID-19. They have surpassed their own cases/death peak from last summer in just 10 days in April 2021 and people are dying at a rate of every 5 minutes. There is drone footage of bodies being burned in the streets because crematoriums are inundated. There are people traveling to 6-7 overcrowded hospitals to find treatment and on their way to the 8th hospital, they tragically die. There is the huge issue of unreported deaths and experts are indicating the death toll to be much higher than what is reported. The ultra-rich in India are attempting to flee the country and there are reports of Amritsar's rich hoarding oxygen tanks. India, in short, is in total chaos.

Why are they being hit by this wave? Because a much more contagious variant known as "double mutant" variant (B.1.617) has more than a dozen mutations in comparison to the original and is about 20% more transmissible than older strains. This strain has been reported in 20 countries including the U.S. (California). The healthcare system is collapsing, oxygen tanks are running empty, and healthcare professionals are working around the clock to save as many lives as possible. They are often faced with making decisions on who to save which has taken a major toll on those frontline workers.

The variance in strains only explains half the picture of why India is being hit so strongly. The other part is due to public health policies which have not been as stringent in South Asia. Prior to this wave, mask-wearers were being peer-pressured to take them off and public health officials were not being taken seriously. The Prime Minister of India, Narenda Modi, was also conducting his fierce political campaign rallies which were made up of large gatherings with an audience that was majorly maskless. There was also a huge Hindu festival that took place a few weeks ago being attended by millions.

Now, on top of all this, one might ask, where are the vaccines? India has approved 3 vaccines: their own brands of the vaccine called "Covaxin" made by company Bharat Biotech and Indian-manufactured vaccine of AstraZeneca called Covishield, along with Russia's Sputnik V. However, due to this surge, India has run out of raw materials to create the vaccine. They are in a huge shortage where vaccine clinics are not able to even open and vaccinate anyone. They had administered 127 million doses at a time when they are seeing close to 300,000+ cases daily. But all that has come to a steady halt as vaccines are in short supply.

The U.S. had known about the situation in India but had not made any indication of helping because of the ban on exporting raw materials. The ban was invoked during the Trump administration with the Defense Production Act (DPA) which was targeted for companies to create raw materials for domestic vaccine production. As of Sunday, President Biden, has lifted the ban on raw materials after immense pressure from the Indian-American community and because Britain, France, and Germany pledged aid, as well. Biden has also pledged to send oxygen, PPE, and doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine to India, as well.

India is the world's largest democracy and the 6th largest economy in the world. Even so, the poverty rate is at 21.9% and experts are saying that this could be a major detriment to India's already declining economy; the working class cannot survive another country-wide lockdown. We need to urge our elected public officials to provide as much assistance as possible to a hard struck part of the world, not because they also helped us when we were hit hard, but because we need to help our fellow humans when given the chance.

Fill out this form to directly send a message to the White House about this: https://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/

If you'd like to help financially, you can find various patients that are in need of help along with organizations that are boots-on-the-ground in India helping those in need: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1eiobgyrl8iz-R1Dz7c4R5pzzzkuZLBj99vaC7T_UeVo/edit

You can also donate to Care's India Covid Relief Fund by clicking here.

 - TBC