The Healers: Awareness is key

“As a medical professional who had just received his MBBS and started internship, the pandemic came as a very unprecedented situation. Since then it has been a continuous fourteen months of Covid duty for me until recently when I have taken a short break, only to resume my duties in a few days time.

During the first wave there were no known treatment protocols available and it took time for us to understand the nature of the disease. I still remember a tragic incident while assisting a senior doctor, when I came across a patient who himself recovered but lost his entire family to this disease in the same hospital. It shook me when he said he didn’t have a home anymore but as a doctor I had to pick myself up and continue my duties.

Back then, India didn’t produce enough PPE kits and availability of such essentials to doctors depended on a hierarchical system that made no sense to me. Things have improved over time but we are still underprepared; if the country had not taken things casually and built better infrastructure over the past one year, the severity of the second wave could have been mitigated. It’s not too late though, we can still equip ourselves against an impending third or fourth wave as already faced by countries across the world.

At present, as a general public, one must verify the source of the plethora of information that has…