Delivering a speech last week, Indian Prime Minister noted that the virus was spreading rapidly in the villages where health infrastructure has collapsed under the world’s biggest surge of daily COVID-19 infections.
Meanwhile, in Barnagar, a small town in the state of Madhya Pradesh, where the hospital bed capacity is already saturated, many young patients are dying owing to an acute shortage of oxygen. Therefore, the Rising World Foundation (RWF), which was founded just a few days after the national lockdown was announced in India last year, is currently fundraising for INR 3,000,000 in order to procure oxygen concentrators and any other oxygen products for the state of Madhya Pradesh in central India.
“Today, you don’t have to be a doctor to save a life,” the Foundation said. “All you have to do is help us get this precious resource in time.”
The RWF was founded by internationally experienced philanthropist and community organizer, Marina Shaikh, who initially set up a small team who delivered relief packages of masks, hand sanitizer and body soap to thousands across India. Over time, she began to recognise new long-term solutions that could break down the structural inequalities that keep Indian communities vulnerable. These ideas led to a new mission of the Foundation, which includes three main pillars, namely, women’s empowerment, health care and agriculture.
Lord Hannan of Kingsclere, Adviser to the UK Board of Trade and Jan Zahradil, Member of the European Parliament for the Czech Republic, together with Nirj Deva, former member of the European Parliament and Publisher of the Global Media Platform, Commonwealthunion.com, support the Rising World Foundation’s fundraising campaign to fight oxygen scarcity.
