COVID Response

COVID Response

COVID Response !

The 2nd wave of the COVID hit the Surguja division as badly as other places in India. In this emergency situation Sangwari decided to respond in a systematic way. We planned our efforts following principles that are likely to benefit in this rapid response

  1. Helping government health system where they need support
  2. Networking with other organisations who are working in different aspects of the covid response
  3. Participatory approach with the people

We divided our response as a short duration mitigation plan and medium duration community based capacity building plan. 

What we are doing 

Home isolation COVID care – In this wave patients prefer to be at their home than isolation centres. In the absence of monitoring for danger signs predisposed them for late identification of complication and thus delay in hospital care. Identifying this need we formulated a programme in 26 remote and tribal villages of Lakhanpur block with help of Chaupal. 

  • We trained 24 volunteers for proper use of PPE and self care to avoid transmission.
  • We are caring for COVID positive patients from approximately 30 thousand people in 26 villages.
  • Identifying symptomatic suspected patients and promoting them for testing 
  • Monitoring oxygen saturation of these covid positive and symptomatic suspected patients with the help of pulse-oximeter
  • Identifying high risks for severe covid disease and referring them for early treatment
  • Promoting covid appropriate behaviour, masking and testing
  • Helping addressing queries around vaccination, myth busting and promoting vaccination
  • Reverse tracing of referred patients and following them up.

Short term mitigation activity:

  • Running a covid ICU at district hospital Ambikapur- We partnered with Government of CG and Doctors For You (DFY) to support district hospital at Ambikapur. The district Hospital helped us in providing space, equipment and necessary systems for an ICU. Joining hand in hand we are now running a 20 bed covid ICU for a period of 3 months.
  • Training for secondary level facility doctors- to address the congestion of patients at the tertiary level district hospital, we proposed local authorities to get more functional beds at the CHC level. We capitalised on the ICU care at the district hospital and proposed 1 week residential training of CHC doctors at the district hospital ICU.