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Meet The Social Entrepreneur Who Started A “Life Saving” Initiative In Afghanistan

Gaurav Singh
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Meet The Social Entrepreneur Who Started A “Life Saving” Initiative In Afghanistan

AFGHANISTAN: Mohammad Naeem Ahady, MBA graduate and a resident of the United Kingdom started a Facebook Group called “Life-Saving Movement” to bridge the gap between a blood donor and the hospitals in Afghanistan. Interestingly, Ahady is an Afghan by birth but moved to the United Kingdom after some time.

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Being thousands of miles away from his own country, Ahady thought of doing something to give back to his motherland. The social entrepreneur has created a Facebook blood donation group with an aim to unite the people of Afghanistan. The group allows the Afghan people to have smooth, synchronized coordination between the citizens, hospitals, and laboratories.

Coalition for better health services in Afghanistan

Afghanistan besides having problems of war has many other problems. In most of the regions in the country, a proper medical healthcare facility isn’t available. Seeing the situation of his motherland, Ahady decided to do something about this. So, he designed a program to solve Afghanistan’s biggest problem that is blood donation.

Talking to Transcontinental Times about his initiative, Ahady said, “I had thought about the idea of blood donation in 2018 but it took me a year to implement it. In Afghanistan, many people are unable to find blood or other facilities on time for normal and Thalassaemia patients. I observed that there was a need for a blood donation program in Afghanistan as the citizens were not getting the required help on time. Along with this, there are some other issues like difficulty in finding family members of accident victims, discoordination amongst hospitals, people, and laboratories.”

Initially, Ahady designed cards to provide emergency services to the citizens of Afghanistan. This card includes basic information about a citizen including his blood group. In case of an emergency, the hospital and medical authorities can check the victim’s card and can find instant details about him. The card is sent via messenger and Whatsapp and printed in Afghanistan.

“Whenever there was an accident in Afghanistan, people generally post about it on FB asking for help to find the accident victim’s family members. It was awkward for me, as we lack a forensic and DNA system. That is when I thought of issuing an emergency card in which the details of the family members can be stored along with their blood group details and this card must be carried in pocket everywhere”, Ahady said.

Working of the emergency card

With the emergency card designed and developed by Mr. Ahady, his team registers the name of the people in a database. Then they act as per the query that is posted on the Facebook group. Later, the number from the database is shared with the patient’s family for instant help.

The FB group was further integrated to use a mobile Application wherein every blood donor is registered to get instant help in the time of need. The system is centralized and each member is required to report his movement. With a centralized system, the team decided to set up laboratories besides hospitals.

However, due to a lack of literacy, infrastructure, and money, it became difficult for citizens and the team to coordinate. To deal with this problem, Ahady decided to set up an online call center. With the help of a Facebook messenger group and all his friends, he brought several SIM cards.

With every query posted on FB, a team member analyzes the patient’s call (identify the SIM card company) and arranges a call back from the same SIM card to cut down the extra cost. This is done to save the cost and time of the patient.

“I came up with the “One Nation, One Centralized National Blood Donation Database” idea which is the perfect and permanent solution to tackle the blood donation problem of not only Afghanistan but any country in the world. We make sure that the demand and supply are in an accurate ratio. We are working towards ending the black market for blood selling rather than donating”, Ahady said.

“We are aiming to slowly make progress, making our infrastructure capable of supplying blood to every hospital in Afghanistan. We are also educating and spreading awareness amongst people,” he further added.

The “blood donation” application

Ahady and his team have created a web and mobile application for the citizens of Afghanistan. The database of the mobile application helps to differentiate between donors and non-donors. Information including the date, name, time is stored in the database. For easy identification between them, the donors’ names are usually highlighted in the database. Various hospitals also have access to the database of the application. The hospital can call registered members at any time for blood donation.

Talking about the challenges, Ahady said, “I faced challenges to communicate with people who weren’t on FB/Whatsapp. However, the challenge didn’t stop me, I thought of designing a database for blood donation and gave it to hospitals (govt/private/small clinics). This has resulted in aiding the hospitals to connect with donors from the database while also registering the new ones. People whether educated or illiterate can now directly go to the hospital and register themselves and can ask help from hospitals to call blood donors.”

Ahady now aims to have a seperate “blood donation departments” in hospitals. He believes that through this people can instantly get help without any confusion and problem.

Bharat Biotech Begins Its Final Stage For Covaxin

Gaurav Singh
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Bharat Biotech Begins Its Final Stage For Covaxin

INDIA. Bhubaneswar: India’s first COVID-19 vaccine, Covaxin, has been developed and is currently in testing. Covaxin is derived from a strain of SARS-CoV-2 which is isolated by ICMR-National Institute of Virology (NIV), Pune.

According to officials, phase III of the human clinical trial will commence soon in Bhubaneswar. The reports say that the clinical trial will take place in a private hospital. The vaccine was developed by Bharat Biotech in collaboration with the ICMR (Indian Council of Medical Research).

The development of Covaxin

Last Friday, Bharat Biotech was permitted to conduct the clinical trial phase III with certain conditions by the DCGI (Drugs Controller General of India). ICMR selected 21 medical institutes across the country among which Bhubaneswar’s IMS and SUM Hospital were included for conducting the third phase trial.

On Sunday, the principal investigator in the Covaxin clinical trial, Dr E. Venkata Rao said that the search for a suitable COVID-19 vaccine has almost come to a final stage. Rao is also a professor in the Department of Community Medicine at the Institute of Medical Sciences and SUM Hospital.

Rao further mentioned that the large-scale efficacy trial involving thousands of volunteers has been planned to post the completion of the first and second phase of the trial with demonstrable safety profile and immunogenicity.

Meanwhile, half of the volunteers would be administered Covaxin while the remaining half would receive a placebo in this phase. For this trial, even healthcare workers will be recruited. The doctor further mentioned that for preventing the development of COVID-19 and checking the efficacy of the vaccine, the volunteers would be followed up over a considerable period of time. Rao also mentioned that the volunteers who offered to help with the trials have been excited to partake in this next step.

Phase III of the clinical trial

The phase III clinical trial will be conducted in 21 sites across ten states. The states include Lucknow, Patna, Delhi, and Mumbai. It will also be covering around 28,500 subjects with the age group of 18 years and above.

As per the media reports, the application proposed a dose of 0.5 mL on day 0 and 28 for the phase III clinical trial. It further mentions that on 2 October, the vaccine maker had applied to the DCGI seeking permission. This was done to conduct a randomised double-blind placebo-controlled multicentre trial of its COVID-19 vaccine which would make up phase III.

Executive Director, Sai Prasad talked about the future plans of Bharat Biotech regarding the COVID-19 vaccine. According to him, Covaxin is planned to be launched by June 2021. However, the vaccine will be launched earlier if the government decides to give an emergency use authorisation before. In the interim, the company is in talks with more than 10 countries that have shown interest in Covaxin.

With the ongoing pandemic, the government has advised the public to contact the central Helpline Number for COVID-19. A person can call 011-23978046 in case of an emergency.

Sibling Duo Creates Ventilator And Automated Hand-Sanitizing Machine To Help Fight The Pandemic

Gaurav Singh
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Sibling Duo Creates Ventilator And Automated Hand-Sanitizing Machine To Help Fight The Pandemic

India. Ambala, Haryana. Young entrepreneurs, Vinayak and Kartik Tara, aged 8 and 12 years old have developed a series of robotic machines to promote social-distancing amongst frontline staff and citizens of India. The brothers have developed a line following robot that follows a certain route and can supply meals and medicines to all the beds in one ward and can take care of 20-25 patients. Created at a bare minimum cost of Rs 1200, the prototypes can be installed at hospitals, vegetable mandis, kirana stores, police stations, and in even police vans.

Further to their series of innovation, they have created distance sensing sunglasses. Keeping social distancing in mind, they have created sunglasses that maintains a fixed distance in public or wherever you go for basic necessities. These sunglasses are integrated with infrared (IR) sensors. If someone comes closer than 1 meter, it starts beeping. It can also be modified to play music or an automated voice saying “please maintain some distance”.

Another such innovation includes an automated appliance control system (mobile app integrated). It can be installed at hospitals at a very low cost in which all the appliances can be operated using a mobile app. The system also has a timer for operating the appliances automatically. An interesting part about this device is that there is no need to change the appliances as this system can be integrated to old devices. This device is also compatible with WiFi and can be made within Rs 1600-1700. Similarly, for helping frontline medical staff at hospitals, the kids have created automatic ventilators and sanitizer dispensers.

Creation of the machines

The sibling duo conceptualized, designed, and built the automated machines under the guidance of Mr. Akshay Ahuja, Founder of RoboChamps.

“We were working in a B2B model before the lockdown where we offer Robotics and Coding courses by setting up Labs in schools, however, due to corona lockdown we found it difficult to keep educating children due to our offline model. Hence we have started consulting them through video conferencing to help them continue with their education.  During the lockdown both our students were bored and thought of creating some robot so we started thinking of innovative ways of how we could create a Robot that could help during Corona, this is where the idea to create this Robot prototype came in mind.” says Mr. Akshay Ahuja, Founder, RoboChamps.

12-year-old Kartik Tara says, “Since the lockdown, we have been seeing news all over the internet, television about how Corona has affected countries, people and economies at a large scale. We got inspired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s initiatives along with a few other startups for dealing with Corona.  I want to contribute to society and promote Skill India.”

Future plans

He further adds, “I plan to be an entrepreneur one day and Akshay Sir has been constantly helping us during this project through video conferencing and we are relentlessly working on creating more Robots for future also”

8-year-old Vinayak Tara quips excitedly, “I am really happy that we created something that will help hospitals and public places. Akshay sir has been mentoring us constantly on a video call and I want to thank him for all his hard work.”

Vinayak has a track record of making more than 16 robots at the age of 5 and has also won India Book of World Record for the same.

Ludhiana Sees 11 Percent Increase In Suicide During Covid-19 Lockdown

Gaurav Singh
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0
Ludhiana Sees 11 Percent Increase In Suicide During Covid-19 Lockdown

India. Ludhiana, Punjab. Since March, the Ludhiana district has registered 11 per cent increase in suicide cases post the Covid-19 lockdown.

The Ludhiana police verified through their investigation that the cause of these cases is a combination of financial crisis, depression, reduced access to primary health care facilities and domestic violence.

Since the Covid-19 lockdown, there were 76 confirmed suicide cases registered in April to June which comprised of 22 females and 54 males. Most of the victims’ cause for such an extreme decision was domestic violence.

Since the start of 2020, there were a total of 137 suicide cases registered in Ludhiana of which 61 cases were reported from January – March. Of these 61 cases, 15 women were registered under suicide.

Domestic violence, job loss and debts

The victims suffering from depression and anxiety ranged from the age group of 9 to 80 years old. As a part of the investigation, it was reported that out of the total suicide cases during the lockdown, 44 people took their lives due to depression. Most of these cases were a result of depression due to job losses during the pandemic.

On 16 May 2020, a nine-year-old young girl committed suicide at Dhandhran Enclave. As per the parents, the victim was depressed and disturbed after a heated argument over playing mobile games with her brother.

As per the police investigation, the secondary reason for these suicide cases was increased domestic violence during the pandemic. Out of the total number of 76 cases, 16 females were suffering from domestic violence leading to such extreme measure. The female victims were between the age group of 19-40 years old. Before March 31st, there were seven suicide cases due to domestic violence.

Furthermore, there were 5 cases registered out of which the cause was financial problems, the age group was between 32-40 years.From the five cases, one of the victims was an employee in a private school.

On May 14, he ended his life while talking to his wife over a video call. He was working as a computer operator in the school and was a resident from Bhai Randhir Singh Nagar. Post the police investigation, they found he owed a debt of Rs 2 lakhs due to which he capitulated to depression.

Pre-lockdown triggers

Before the lockdown, seven suicide cases were registered. The cause was poor financial conditions. The victims were in the age group of 20-36 years old.

On the 1st of April, police had registered a case of a debt-ridden male, killing himself, aged 40 years old. The police state that no such cases were reported before the lockdown period.

Four people committed suicide due to failing health from the age group of 42-45 years old while 5 more cases were registered from the age group of 17-25 years old, cause being academic stress.

Before the lockdown, poor health had driven eight people to suicide.

Police statement

Akhil Chaudhary, Deputy Commissioner of Police, headquarters, mentions that such suicidal tendencies were due to the paradox between reality and expectation when it comes to professional and personal life.

He further states that the police had investigated the cause of all the cases registered in the city under suicide to understand the reason behind such extreme measures taken by the victims. 

Dr Nidhi Aggarwal,assistant professor from Christian Medical College and Hospital,states that people who lost their daily income source were majorly affected by the pandemic-induced lockdown.

The lockdown has impacted people from all age groups in various aspects such as financial, psychological, physical or emotional.

As per police records, a total of 137 people including 37 women have ended their lives between the period between January 1 – June 15.

Helpline Numbers

There are helpline numbers, if your know someone who might need help or you are the person who needs help, please connect on these numbers or the nearest mental health or wellness expert.

Aasra: 022 2754 6669;

Sneha India Foundation: +914424640050

Sanjivini: 011-24311918

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