Comments on the lack of COVISHIELD, a vaccine against coronavirus disease (COVID-19) manufactured by the Serum Institute of India, are seen outside a COVID-19 vaccination center in Mumbai, India, April 20, 2021. REUTERS / Francis Mascarenhas
After spending hours unsuccessfully calling on government helplines looking for a hospital bed for a critically ill COVID-19 patient, Indian lawyer Jeevika Shiv posted an SOS request on Twitter.
“Serious patient # covid19 from #Delhi with oxygen level 62 needs hospital bed immediately”, Shiv, part of a volunteer healthcare group COVID-19 of 350 members, he said on Twitter the end of last week.
Help came quickly. The patient found a bed and soon showed signs of recovery.
“Eventually, the online help worked because people responded with information,” Shiv said.
India reports more than 250,000 new cases of COVID-19 per day in the worst phase of the pandemic. Hospitals remove patients, and sources of oxygen and drugs are depleted.
In response, people bypass conventional lines of communication and turn to Twitter to provide help for oxygen cylinders, hospital beds and other requirements.
People in need and those with information or resources share the phone numbers of volunteers, providers who have oxygen cylinders or medications, and details about which the medical unit can take patients who use hashtags such as #COVIDSOS.
Some users have offered to help you home-cooked meals for COVID patients in quarantine home and to meet a number of other needs, such as arranging pet feeding.
“Twitter needs to do what government assistance numbers should do,” Twitter user Karanbir Singh wrote.
“We’re on our own.”
Twitter is not as widely used in India as Facebook or WhatsApp, but it is proving to be a more valuable tool for obtaining requests for help in the coronavirus crisis, largely due to its “re-tweet” function that can quickly amplify a message through through users networks of contacts.
A Google spreadsheet compiled by a group of volunteers gathering information on hospital beds, oxygen sources, blood plasma and ambulance helplines in different states is quickly distributed on Twitter and runs for dozens of pages.
Bengaluru software developer Umang Galaiya, 25, has created a website that allows users to select the city name and requirement – whether it’s oxygen or the antiviral drug remdesivir – and then directs them to Twitter results using the feature its advanced search. .
His website received over 110,000 hits.
“All the other tweets in my feed were about COVID,” Galaiya said.
“I’m glad people find this helpful.”
But for some, help comes too late.
On Monday, journalist Sweta Dash posted on Twitter a request for help finding a bed with a fan for a pregnant woman in New Delhi. Her message quickly spread through more than 100 redistributions, and a Delhi government official soon suggested a hospital.
But a few hours later, Dash posted another message.
“The patient has died.”
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