Situation in India

Until mid-May, the Corona News in India focused almost exclusively on the devastating effects of the lockdown on day laborers and migrant workers. In the meantime, the virus has taken on massive proportions in India and affects all levels of society! On July 16th, the one million mark of confirmed corona cases was exceeded, today (25.08.2020) it is already 3.6 million, and the curve is still rising daily. Already 58,000 people have died from Covid-19. India is now in third place worldwide behind the USA and Brazil (Source with actual data: Wikipedia).

Situation of the people in India

Medical care is not guaranteed: sick people in the cities go from hospital to hospital, are not admitted because of overcrowding and die. Those who do get a bed in a hospital, however, experience inhuman treatment as Covid-19 patients. The news brings reports about people who have died in hospital, who are not picked up by their relatives and “disposed of” in mass graves. In addition to the famine caused by the lockdown, which at first affected “only” one fifth of the population, the direct effects of the virus are now being added to this. It affects everyone, regardless of the social circumstances. With the return of hundreds of millions of migrant workers from the cities to their home villages, the virus has also spread to the countryside. This means that people are infected with Covid-19 in each of our fields of work.

From April to June, we did nothing more than distribute relief supplies to help where we could. Also in July we continued to visit several villages, and the actions are still going on. The first photo below shows a distribution action for several hundred widows (click on the right side of the picture to see more pictures):

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The situation of our staff in India

So far all our friends of UPPAHAR India are healthy. This is a miracle for us, because they are very active in relief supplies and are therefore exposed to a high risk of infection. We see this as the answer to many prayers for our employees – and thank them from the bottom of our hearts!

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Thank you very much for your help, without which we could not do this work!