Saving Lives: Isha’s COVID Action Makes a Significant Impact

The Second Wave: Expanding and Intensifying the Outreach

The second wave of COVID-19 hit India hard, with infections skyrocketing at an exponential rate. Promptly, Isha Outreach intensified its pandemic relief activities, focusing on 43 villages around the Isha Yoga Center, across 17 panchayats. These ongoing initiatives are making a huge difference in the community – supporting frontline workers, saving lives, uplifting spirits, and offering dignity in death.

Free Transport for Patients

Isha volunteers are providing free and safe transport for patients who cannot afford ambulances to take them to hospitals and COVID Care Centers. By getting the patients to the hospital before their health situation worsens, this essential service is saving many lives. Utmost care is taken to maintain all safety protocols while transporting patients.

“Initially, there was a hesitation in me to step out. But then I thought of the frontline warriors who are willing to put their lives at stake to offer their support in this challenging situation. Sadhguru has given me the opportunity to do something for these people – this thought made me do it with utmost joy and dedication.”
— Sakthivel, Tiruvannamalai

Nutritional Refreshment Kits for Frontline Workers

Even the frontline workers who have easy access to food are often constrained by long and irregular working hours under stressful conditions. Sometimes, there is simply no time to sit down for a full meal, especially when they are out in the field. To support these frontline workers, volunteers have come up with the remarkable solution of creating and distributing “Nutritional Refreshment Kits,” containing handmade multigrain cookies and a package of high-quality buttermilk. These have a long shelf life and are easily stored and transported.

In Tamil Nadu, Isha Outreach has so far supplied 75,000 refreshment kits to 13 government hospitals, benefitting 7000 medical personnel.

“Government Rajaji Hospital is one of the oldest hospitals in Madurai, with more than 150 nurses on duty. We handed over the Nutritional Refreshment Kits to the chief nurse, who shared that they normally receive only cooked food packets, and they were extremely grateful for these quality cookies and buttermilk because they could store them and have them whenever needed, unlike cooked food.”
—Manimaran, Madurai

This effort is ongoing outside Tamil Nadu as well. Four thousand five hundred Nutritional Refreshment Kits were delivered to the Traffic Management Centre, Bengaluru City Police, for distribution to its personnel. A plan is underway to provide 25,000 nutritional kits to other police forces as well.

Continuing its year-long on-ground pandemic relief activities, Isha Outreach extended its support to frontline workers in Puducherry. Isha volunteers met the Lieutenant Governor of Puducherry, Dr. Tamilisai Soundarajan, and donated 12,750 refreshment kits for frontline workers.

Immunity Boosting Yogic Practices

Sadhguru has devised certain simple but potent yogic practices that boost oxygen levels and help enhance one’s immunity. In order to make them available to a large number of people, volunteers are conducting webinars as well as in-person sessions. So far, Simha Kriya has been offered to 17,000 citizens in Tamil Nadu, benefitting people from all walks of life, including medical personnel, farmers, teachers, IT professionals, and corporate leaders.

Before Tamil Nadu went into lockdown, 500 trained volunteers (Yoga Veeras) personally taught the Yogic practice of Surya Shakti to 5000 people across the state.

From its launch on 7 May till 31 May, 61 webinars were conducted with 22,808 people participating.

COVID Helplines with Emotional Support and Telemedicine

A 24x7 helpline supported by 21 doctors and 18 volunteers aids COVID-19 patients by providing doctor consultations through telephone and online to facilitate their treatment and recovery under home isolation. Over 200 patients have already benefitted from the consultations in less than two weeks of its inception.

Additionally, volunteers are providing emotional support to individuals and families who are in states of mental suffering and grief. There is also an active Telegram group where 200+ volunteers share requests and information related to medical support in the region (such as plasma requirements/donors, oxygen cylinder and concentrator requirements/supplier information, hospital bed availability, etc.)

Working with the Tamil Nadu Government

Isha COVID Action handed over 500 oxygen concentrators, 2 vehicles, as well as several hundred PPE kits and masks to the Government of Tamil Nadu, to support frontline workers in government hospitals. In addition, Isha also contributed 500 PPE kits, 5000 N95 face masks, and 500 Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) machines directly to the Coimbatore Government Hospital.

Sadhguru also offered the premises of all Isha Vidhya schools in nine districts of the state to the government, to be used as COVID Care Centers.

Dignity in Death

Hospitals are overflowing with patients and sadly, so are the crematoriums. With the pandemic claiming a large number of lives in a short span of time, dead bodies of COVID-19 victims are often left outside crematoriums, sometimes for many hours. An acute shortage of space and resources is preventing families from giving a dignified farewell to their loved ones and posing a critical challenge for administrations. In view of this dire situation, Sadhguru emphasized that treating the dead with respect and dignity is essential both for the deceased and the bereaved.

Transportation Support

A common problem that families face is finding hearse vans to take the dead to the crematoriums. Forty mortuary vans have been provided to transport the deceased from the overflowing mortuaries of government hospitals to the crematoriums. Isha volunteers are also coordinating with state health authorities, government hospitals, and grieving relatives to arrange for transportation. In cases where close family members are also hospitalized and unable to escort the deceased to the crematorium, volunteers are contacting other relatives to ensure that last rites are performed and all formalities completed.

Extending Cremation Services

A dedicated group of Isha volunteers have stepped up their efforts to ensure that the eighteen government crematoriums operated by Isha in Tamil Nadu are able to handle the large volumes of deceased COVID-19 victims and ensure that last rites are performed timely while adhering to all the safety protocols. The crematoriums have been expanded with additional temporary furnaces and stay open for longer hours. Volunteers are working tirelessly to ensure that the deceased are treated with utmost sensitivity and respect.

One volunteer taking care of the crematoriums shared: “After the cremation and rituals are over, many relatives share with us about the peace of mind and gratitude that they experience. They tell us how touched they are that we are maintaining a sacred atmosphere. It exceeds all their expectations. When they share such experiences with us, we feel very fulfilled doing this activity in these challenging times.”