COVID - 19 RELIEF DISTRIBUTION - 2021 - IN SUPPORT OF PERSONALIZED ODYSSEYS, USA
DISTINCTIVE NEPAL COMMUNITY OUTREACH PROGRAM – 2021
As a second wave of Covid – 19, Nepal has been affected badly compared to first one (last year). Nepalese had faced approx. a year long lockdown with restriction on several movements and activities. However, there were limited covid cases with fewer human casualties in 2020. Due to the lockdown most of the people lost there jobs and struggling to live. This second wave of Covid -19 in 2021 was catastrophic with sudden spike on the number infected people with high death rate. There has been already restrictions on Hotels/Group Meetings/Schools/ E.t.c but since March, 2021 there has been sudden increment in number of infection and the situation goes uncontrollable where Government of Nepal has to announce strict lockdown since 20th April, 2021 which continues till date ( 14th June, 2021) and As of the record 14th June, 2021, there are in total 608472 Cases with 8,412 death toll.
On 27th May, 2021 Ministry of Health said ” Since coronavirus cases have spiked beyond the capacity of the health system and hospitals have run out of beds, the situation is unmanageable.” The Ministry also said it had no more vaccines.
Nepal has experienced a shortage of oxygen supplies for those who fall severely ill. The tolls of the virus roll down steep slopes of inequality impacted by social-structural factors like ethnicity, class, caste, geography and gender that co-mingle with public health policies. Nepal acutely illustrates how these differences exacerbated by a pandemic can lead to synergistic epidemics, or “syndemics.”
Coronavirus is an unprecedented global health crisis in the recent History of World. The expansion of COVID-19 left all children out of school. Even children who are orphan & vulnerable are becoming more risk of Coronavirus along with the Lower and Middle class those who need to work daily for living. Homeless people are far more in trouble. In contrary to other developed countries, Nepalese people are deprived of relief for living from Government. Many Volunteers are working hard to help those needy people.
There are two major areas where we need to help. The one and family with corona virus with serious health issues and not getting proper treatment due to lack of money. Lack of oxygen and other medical equipements (which now has been solved somewhat due to aids that received locally and Internationally). Another victims are the people not from Covid itself but due to the poor economic condition, they are suffering a lot. They are helpless as they cannot go out for work due to lockdown and even there is a difficulty for volunteers to reach out to those needy people to help.
Distinctive Nepal is working along with various activists and volunteer group to help the needy people with support of kind-hearted people around the world who has been our guest in the past. I would like to mention about Mrs. Sandy Colony from Personalized Odysseys, USA who has helped us significantly and we would like to thank for her initiation in collecting and sending donation. Our further relief movement is being only possible with her support.
We respect the privacy of each and every individual, so we avoid publishing or advertising in social media for those we have helped. Among the few pictures that we have, we will be using only in our blog/report to share with our donors only. We have published this blog in our website as we will be sharing the stories among our donors with the link.
I would like to share some of the representative stories among our donors.
Mr. Dilli B. Karki (Nickname: Shanker) is from one of the village from Nepal who works in field to live. Before lockdown, while he was working in village, he has fallen from a big tree where he has seriously injured his both legs. He is paralyzed and cannot move around. He was shifted Kathmandu and rent a small room in a corner for further treatment which was too costly that he cannot afford it. He has to sell all his properties in village including house and land where he works. All his funds that he got of around US$ 10,000 has finished in his treatment. On top of that he had borrowed around US $ 10000. Still he has to continue his treatment but unable to visit hospital due to lack of fund. The lockdown proved to be more serious for him and his family that he could not get medicines, couldn’t pay for rent and even he was struggling to feed his family and himself. The situation was deteriorating. His situation was revealed by one of the local media and we tried to rushed to help him the way we can. We have communicated with him and we have handed over some funds to him as a first installment. We have realized that he has been helping by other kindhearted people as well. We are happy to bring some smile on his face. Still we have lockdown, He has gathered some funds and other help that he will be able to get further treatment and happy for all the fortune that he got which otherwise will not be possible for all the victims with similar cases as him. We will keep in touch with him to know more about his situation in future. His situation for living is getting better.
*********************
Since there are many people lost their job and came to street, There are several spots where needy people gather to receive food. We have joined hands with several volunteers to feed them for several days. It counts today 4th day that we are feeding for approx 200 people daily in various spots with the help of local volunteers and several organizations with our direct involvement. Most of them are very poor and homeless those who need to work on daily basis to live. Lockdown is nightmare for them. They are not afraid of any virus than hunger virus. Its pity to see them begging in the street for food to survive. We have clicked some moments just to share with our donors as below.
We are feeding food on daily basis for the people who even don’t have proper shelter, however, there are needy people those living in temporary shelter near Bagmati river bank with small kitchen who can cook their own meal. For those, we have provided food package that will help them to survive for a month at least during this lockdown. Glimpses of the volunteer activities below with food packages.
******************
*************************
We are still continue in providing emergency relief to needy people (Group & Individual) in spite of ongoing strict lock down where normal movement is prohibited. We will continue to share stories and feedback. Please do check our website for regular updates.
We would like to thanks all those kind hearted donors and special thanks for Mrs. Colony for all her initiation.
******************