Combating Covid-19 Pandemic – The Beginning
Covid-19 is testing the humanitarian community and its ability to help people in crises. Ehsaas International, essentially not an emergency or disaster relief organization , decided to shoulder the responsibility during the unfortunate crises to shoulder the responsibility during the unfortunate crisis. Ehsaas International accessed the situation as it unfolded with first Covid Positive case in Mid March 2020 and straightaway got to the heart of things with practicality. Ehsaas decided to act as back support to frontline healthcare professionals who are actually putting every effort and fighting the lethal pandemic head on. Ehsaas International got into designing and delicering PPE’s (Personal Protection Equipment), face masks, face shields etc to hospitals and quarantine centers across Kashmir.
Getting to the Problem:
It all started with the news of the first Covid-19 positive case in the valley in Mid-March 2020 , the core leadership of Ehsaas started deliberating on the shadow of pandemic that was looming large on the valley and already had impacted big , developed countries of the world. It know form the outset that this situation was entirely of a different nature, not like floods or earthquakes , but world now was lighting a war with an unseen enemy, a virus that was so contagious that it spread like wildfire and the worst thing was that the there was no vaccine for it . Ehsaas analyzing the situation around the world knew that the only thing that could be done was to provide a back-end support to the front line workers like medics, paramedics etc who were working on the front line to control this. The statistics around the world showed that protective gears for doctors and other front line workers was a must and most of the developed countries of the world were literally struggling to provide necessary protective gears to its front line healthcare workers .Finally provision of Protective gears was identified as problem and viable solution to it were thought out.
Ideating and Prototyping
Meetings were held with experts from medical field across the globe wherever Ehsaas had its reach, to understand the specifications and use of protective gears. Subsequently prototypes of Triple layer face masks, PPE Suits and face shields were prepared and demonstrated to experts who approved of the designs and upheld its usage at times when there was sure dearth of gears across the country in general and Kashmir Particular .
Production Mechanism:
Instantly a full-fledged plan was chalked out to have the mass production of approved prototype and provide the same in best possible professionals manner to our healthcare workers who were standing stall against the pandemic. Skilled craftsman were identified , trained specifically for the need and 27 production centers with more than 300 workers were set up in quick succession and production at full throttle was rolled out.
Getting volunteers onboard
We all face a time in life when we have to take tough or different decisions, in this journey Ehsaas too encountered certain situations wherein they had to take that difficult call, make a decision could eventually make or break. The leadership of Ehsaas was willing to take the risk because the problem was huge and it was human lives that were at risk because the problem was huge and it human lives that were at stake . The foremost decision was to get team of volunteers on ground knowing full well that anyone could contract this deadly virus and within no time can get the whole team involved whole involved with a constant risk of life . This decision however was made easy with the commitment and sense of duty to society by the team of volunteers who were ready to step out of then out of their homes and work on ground.
Challenges with raw materials
The second most important decision however was from an organizational point of view wherein Ehsaas has to live up to its made commitment and expectations thereof .The demand for gear was massive, the preparation wasn’t enough and the raw material was very limited But like they say, “where there is a will there is a way” . Firstly we managed raw material whatever we could get from local vendors across various district wherever it was available in any way. It was never going to be enough , so with the active help and coordination with the administration truck loads of material was arranged from Jaipur amidst the country wide lock down. It was huge challenge but was achieved.
Up-scaling Multipronged
The demand for the PPE kits was huge, that meant the production of these kits had to shot up instantaneously as well. Whilst Ehsaas was increasing their production centers, also provided a beautiful of opportunity to involve such tailors, craftsman, their team who particularly belong to a under privileged section or our society. These tailors were out of work, and were as good as jobless, coming form financially humble backgrounds, they had no new orders for stitching . Our involvement fo these tailors, craftsmen meant that we could increase our production and at the same time could provide livelihood to these set of people who were on the brink of not even managing hand to mouth survival . Many of these of people had families to feed and these orders of PPE Kits became their means of sustenance and they were speared of the horror of going to people and seeking help financially.
Contentment and Motivation
One of the high’s during these hard times for Ehsaas was first of all the acceptability of their produced safety gears by the health officials, and also that sense that Ehsaas was able to provide this help to the doctors, paramedics and other officials who were on the front lines working to content this pandemic . This essence of playing a critical role in the dark hour was a continuous motivation , and kept the whole team up running during the most testing times. The team in the going to hospitals , quarantine centers and handing over the produced safety gears, and the team in the back ground working at production centers , and the main office were constantly facing the threat of catching the deadly infection, but nothing was to deter then, The team kept on moving in the right direction following all SOPs in leaps and bounds and all the prayers of community kept them safe.
Ehsaas’s vision is clear ,the know one thing and that is being ready to help , to support , to be there is any sort of situation that requires them to step up, be it short term and situational, or long term and strategic. Ehsaas never stays back and jis always on the move to do whatever it takes for making lives better.
Filling the Need Gap
The gap was huge, the gap was apparent, the gap was widening. As everybody was caught off guard , not only in the country but around the world, doctors, health workers , frontline workers were facing this huge challenge of inadequate safety gears. In such circumstances, it was apparent what we needed to do, and that was to fill this gap of providing protection gears to people fighting this virus head on . Our team on the ground , innovated and improvised every day, a great deal of emphasis was put on delivering it in huge numbers was put on delivery quality product and delivering it in huge numbers in the shortest possible time .Which we achieved to a great extent .
District Disaster Management Authority (DDMA) Support
Our work during Covid-19 crises was majorly bases on working closely with the District Disaster Management Authority DDMA Srinagar . It was through continuous encouragement and support from Dr. Shahid Chowdary IAS, Chairman DDMA we could deliver on a large scale, and directly support the people who were our first line of defense in this pandemic .The DDMA could identify the nature of the task we had undertaken and its criticality, reached out to us with full support, to an extent that DDMA had attached with us full-time transport, this helped us to stay mobile during the lock down and we could expedite the upscale of the production of PPEs and also distribute it in the best possible way . DDMA’s open attitude towards our work and allotting full time vehicles with us for more than a couple of months says volumes of their support and the coordination we worked with. It proved highly effective.
Societal support
While the major economics around the globe were alarmingly coming down , it did not deter some individual donors who were quick and empathetic enough to understand the gravity of the issue we had on our hands and come forward in numbers, the contributed significant amount of donations towards us, which helped us to keep running and delivering these safety gears to front-line officials across districts, getting the PPEs ready for use was not an easy job by any stretch of the imagination, and it was due to the help of such people coming forward and donating, we were able to keep the show running on a large scale.
Delivery reach across districts
After the prototype for the protective kits was approved, we started making these gears for health and frontline personnel for District Srinagar in the beginning, however, the demand was so high and the availability of such gears was not enough, we had to make a decision to reach out to other districts because of the continuous request from other districts as well, this simply meant we had to increase our production multifold and the space for any error was ‘zero’ these were safety kits and any loose ends in them meant directly putting people using them at risk, the quality had to be an absolute 100% which we did eventually and were able to reach out to all districts of Kashmir valley.
Ehsaas International Incorporated in UPSC syllabus
It’s a proud moment for team Ehsaas that their work was recognized and now has been incorporated in the UPSC Syllabus, it says a lot of the effectiveness with which the organization has worked and the officials somewhere too have realized that there is a lot to learn from this experience and can be handy elsewhere.
PROTECTIVE GEARS DELIVERED ACROSS KASHMIR TO VARIOUS HOSPITALS /DISTRICT ADMINISTRATIONS ETC.
| CHEST DISEASE HOSPITAL | DDMA SRINAGAR | ZMO ZADIBAL |
| SKIMS JVC | DDMA ANANTNAG | ZMO BATAMALOO |
| SMHS SRINAGAR | DDMA PULWAMA | ZMO SR GUNJ |
| SKIMS SOURA | DDMA BARAMULLA | ZMO HAZRATBAL |
| GOUSIA HOSPITAL | DDMA KULGAM | KIDNEY HOSPITAL |
| GMC SRINAGAR | DDMA SHOPAIN | TRAUMA HOSPITAL KANGAN |
| JLNM HOSPITAL | DDMA KUPWARA | CMO KUPWARA |
| BONE & JOINT HOSPITAL | DDMA BANDIPORA | BMO BEERWAH |
| GMC ANANTNAG | DDMA GANDERBAL | PHC KREMSHORE |
| GMC BARAMULLA | SMC SRINAGAR | PHC KHAAG |
| CMO SRINAGAR | DIRECTORATE OF HEALTH SERVICES | PHC POSHKAR MAGAM |
| BMO CHATTARGAM | SRINAGAR AIRPORT | RAILWAYS HOSPITAL |
| BMO GUREZ | QUARANTINE CENTERS SGR | PUBLIC WORKS PDD, R&B |
| BMO TANGDAR | SDM SUMBAL | SRTC |
The Covid_19 Warriors
Hope can be a powerful force. May be there’s no actual magic in it, but when you know what you hope for most and hold it like a light within you, you can make things happen, almost like magic, our heroes during this pandemic have surely been our fantastic team of volunteers, who like warriors stepped up in the times when it was next to unimaginable, they left their homes, worked 24×7, expertly did what was expected, and every day without caring about the threat that we all were open to, made sure we delivered the best and thus giving back to the society that, which it was needed the most.