DONATE PLASMA, SAVE LIVES!
By: Sannidhya Shanvi
“India, right now, accounts for around 1 out of every 3, covid-19 cases that are being recorded worldwide, every day.”
India is burning but without oxygen. A deadly second wave of the coronavirus has left India struggling to even breathe. The hospitals and crematoriums have been overrun with an increasing number of cases every day. The massive spread of the second wave of covid-19 in India has outrun the healthcare system over here and the ratio of the number of patients to the number of beds available has been alarmingly increasing day by day. While there are no signs of the spread slowing down anytime soon, our overwhelmed healthcare system is facing shortages of beds, ventilators, oxygen supply, and medicines. There have been more than 2 lakh reported covid deaths in our country and the main reason behind the startling number is the scarcity of resources.
The numbers have been extremely frightening as it has been recorded that India is seeing 2 deaths every 1 minute and 4 covid cases per second. With very little to almost no resource being available to bring a halt to this number, the condition in India has become very helpless. According to the statistics, around 4 lakh cases are coming up each day and the resources available to treat these people are less than even 20% of them. This has been the main reason behind the increasing number of deaths in our country. Patients are firstly being denied beds in hospitals and those who somehow manage to arrange a bed for themselves, are not able to get sufficient oxygen to be able to sustain them. A lot of these patients also need plasma therapy to recover from covid.
PLASMA THERAPY:
Plasma therapy mainly refers to the process of using antibodies from the blood of a recovered covid-19 patient to treat those who are critically infected by the virus. Plasma therapy for covid treatment has proved to be helpful as it might result in treating the disease completely, lessening the intensity of the spread, or reducing the duration of the disease in one’s body.
Amidst the increasing number of deaths due to covid, plasma therapy has been a sigh of relief for the patients as well as their families. Despite a suitable alternative being available for treating the patients, people and hospitals have been struggling to get plasma donations from people. Out of the total number of people recovering from covid-19, less than 10% of them have only been donating their plasma to save the lives of those suffering. This has created a state of chaos with families and friends of patients desperately trying to convince people to donate their plasma. It is extremely saddening to see the plight of the families of those who are dealing with covid or those who have succumbed to the disease.
We have observed that recovered people, in general, have been reluctant towards donating their plasma. The major reason behind this is some myths about donating plasma that people have been believing all this while. Some of these myths are:
· If they donate plasma, their immunity level will drop. This is not at all true because and the body remains healthy even after donating plasma.
· They cannot donate plasma again. Unlike blood, plasma regenerates itself after a few hours of donation and hence can be donated again.
· They might get covid positive if they donate plasma. People need to know that there is no chance of them getting covid positive because of donating plasma.
These are some of the myths that people have been believing and have been resisting themselves from helping the patients. However, they need to understand that, them donating their plasma will only help doctors save people’s lives and nothing else. Amidst the massive surge in the number of covid cases, the need of the hour for people is to come forward and donate plasma to save the lives of people. Since these people have known what struggling with covid-19 felt like, they should understand the condition of the families and friends of the ones who are suffering right now.
DONATING PLASMA:
There have been several initiatives started by a lot of people across the country to amplify the requests for plasma donations required for the patients. We request eligible donors to come forward in support of such people and reach out to those who need them. As Juvenile Care, VIT, we urge people, who have recovered from Covid-19, to step up and save lives by donating their plasma before they get themselves vaccinated. If each one of us takes a step and makes sure to donate our plasma after getting recovered, we will be able to save a lot of lives and stop the disastrous spread of the virus. It is the least we can do to support mankind in such daunting times and help our country win over covid.
