India Covid-19 appeal: Deaths in rural areas soar as second wave spreads

The Herald has joined forces with World Vision to support India in its fight against the Covid-19 outbreak. Today we conclude our coverage with an update from the front line. Every story in our series has a click-through button so you can donate direct to World Vision and help provide desperately needed supplies of oxygen, beds, medical supplies and food. Thanks to readers' generosity, donations now total more than $600,000.

India's second wave of Covid-19 is causing a huge increase in death and suffering in rural areas which health workers fear will soon grow even worse.

World Vision interviews with villagers and their own staff and volunteers describe multiple deaths in small villages, growing poverty as rural people are unable to work and fear of hospitals and vaccination.

"In the past two months, at least 40 people died in our village," said Milisha, from Dungri, a village in Jharkhand, north-east India.

"The virus has spread in our entire village and someone or the other is unwell in every house.

Families devastated by Covid-19 need you. Please click here to donate now at worldvision.org.nz and save lives

"We are unable to get oxygen because we are poor. People aren't able to find medicines in the pharmacy near the village. Even if they find the medicine, they have to pay huge amounts for it - which is unaffordable.

"Although everyone tries to stay indoors, the poor daily wage labourers are forced to go and find work to feed their family."

Community volunteer Mohammad Mamood said the problem was the same in the nearby state of Bihar.

"In every village in our district there are 10-15 deaths. There are at least 500 cases in the entire district. Recently, there were three deaths in a single family.

Mamood said people were dying because of fear of going to the district hospitals.

"They think if they go there they will die. Unfortunately, they are dying without proper treatment at home."

Many villagers were also afraid of getting the Covid vaccine, he said.

Reena, a World Vision-sponsored child, in Ranchi, Jharkhand, lost her father Jeevan to the virus, even though he went to the nearby Covid hospital.

"Three people in my community died of Covid, and so the entire community is fearful now. Because of my father's death, we are struggling for food in our family and our education is at stake."

The 13-year-old is the oldest of three siblings. Her younger brother, Pritam (5), is going to nursery school and the youngest sibling, Palvi (2), is a toddler.

Reena's mother, Shanthi, who is a homemaker is completely devastated by her husband's untimely death.

"Since the time he died, my mind has stopped functioning," she said.

"He was the only earning member in our family and I don't know what to do. I'm so helpless. We are worried about our next meal, about filling our stomach."

Health workers and relatives carry the body of a person who died of Covid-19 for cremation in Jammu, India. Photo / AP

Aruna, an accredited social health activist in Unnao, Uttar Pradesh, said the disease was spreading into villages because most men were daily wage labourers who went to the nearest town for work.

"I've not seen such a health crisis in the last 14 years of being a health worker in three villages."

Other health workers said children and pregnant women were not receiving visits or medication because of the pandemic. Many children had not been to school for over a year and did not have mobile phones to do online learning.

World Vision India national director Madhav Bellamkonda said there had been an alarming increase in the number of COVID-19 cases and related deaths in rural areas.

"Much more needs to be done urgently to improve the capacity of rural hospitals to treat the affected people and save precious lives".

Bellamkonda said last year's first wave of Covid-19 had a devastating impact on the poor.

"With the second wave overwhelming the country, we are starting to see a similar impact."

He said the pandemic was no longer an urban phenomena as Covid-19 spread to many rural areas and affected the livelihood of millions of rural people.

"This latest surge is also having dire consequences for children whose access to essential health, social, protection and education services is constrained. Children are facing mental health issues and are at greater risk of violence as lockdowns shut them off from their vital support networks.

After the first Covid-19 wave swept India last year, numerous reports tried to tally the cost to the poor. Pew, a research institute, estimates that whereas just 4.3% of Indians were earning less than $2 a day in January 2020, a year later this had risen to 9.7%, or 134m people.

An in-depth study by Azim Premji University in Bangalore suggests that in the wake of last year's nationwide lockdown, some 230m Indians slipped below a poverty threshold tied to the national minimum wage (around $45 a month).

Its researchers found that, during the lockdown, 90% of the poor consumed less food. Six months later, their diets had not returned to normal.

Over the course of the year the earnings of Indian workers, including the lucky 10% who hold salaried jobs, declined by a third.

World Vision New Zealand national director Grant Bayldon said the Herald's amazing response to the devastating crisis in India would continue to save lives.

"Thanks to the incredible support of Kiwis and others across the world, World Vision has been able to help 62 million people since the Covid-19 global pandemic began."

Families devastated by Covid-19 need you. Please click here to donate now at worldvision.org.nz and save lives

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· Oxygen
· Hospital beds
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