by Father Leon Cruz Ratinam for BISMumbai

The COVID-19 second wave surge is trying the patience, perseverance and peace of all across social strata. In this pandemic paroxysm, the MumbaiSalesians' SYM in collaboration with the Archdiocese of Bombay's Outreach Team has committed itself to 'digital' resourcefulness in Mumbai, Pune, Nashik and Goa.

Hundreds of SYM volunteers are committed to providing accurate and verified digital assistance through networking and pooling of available data. Some of the young people are logging 07-08 hours of laborious effort vetting, verifying and compiling the vast data into usable PDFs. The availability of oxygen cylinders, beds with ventilator-facility, home ICU setups, drugs procurement, plasma-donors, vaccination centres, testing labs, and other essential info is updated every evening. This is helping people to quickly find resources on an urgent emergency basis.

As the COVID-19 urgency rapidly begian to blow-out-of-proportions in Western India, the SYM-CTF team was set up within a single day on 29 April 2021, starting work on 30 April. Soon, thanks to the enthusuadm of the young people to contribute their mite, teams in Nashik and Pune sprouted to cater to their respective regions. The enthusiasm of the youth to do their bit to help someone during this time of crisis is commendable.

The SYM-CTF is a research collaborator of the Archdiocesan Outreach Team that consists of doctors who have set up COVID-19 Helplines to reach out to the needy in Mumbai. A few trained SYM-CTF volunteers also help with calls for the Archdiocesan COVID-19 Helplines.

The resounding success of this collaborative outreach keeps the young people to be 'moved by hope' within the outreach scope, helping numerous needy cope with their struggles.

MumbaiSalesians' Provincial Father Savio Silveira says, "I convey my heartfelt gratitude to everyone, especially the young people, working on saving lives and doing it on a daily basis."

SYM-Covid Task Force Report (as received via WhatsApp from Dr. Zynia )

30 April – Found a Plasma donor in Thane on the very first day

30 April – Appreciation for connecting the patient in hosp with the donor

01 May – Helped save one more person through plasma bank

02 May – Appreciation from Dr. Zynia and calling team for being the backbone of the helpline

03 May – Got a B+ve plasma to the donor

03 May – Data made digital by Fr. Leon and Media team

03 May – Archdiocese circulates the helpline message and numbers once again

03 May – Calling team appreciates the efforts by Research team, clarity of data, organized way it is done and shares loads of blessings for all those working in the backend.

03 May – Connected one more donor to a critical patient.

04 May – Dr. Zynia along with TLs connected one patient with a donor through help of local NGO.

05 May – Nashik and Pune teams successfully briefed and set up giving the Mumbai example. Our sheet helped in their training and getting them started

05 May – Archdiocese team extends their heartfelt gratitude for one week for successful service to people. Reached to an average of 900 in one week through the helpline and hopefully much more with the leads already digital.

05 May – relatively lesser leads verified. TLs scramble for data and modify the team strategy. They even help out in searching resources for a requirement in Goa.

06 May – A request to boost vaccination data from calling team. Research team turns around with data within 4 hours.

06 May – A person managed to get oxygen concentrator from the verified data list for a patient.

06 May – Dr. Zynia managed to find a donor and connect with a patient requiring A positive plasma.

06 May – Connected another donor with Plasma requirement in Panvel

06 May – Had a call with priests and youth in Goa and shared resources and tips to set up a CTF team for people of Goa

07 May – A plasma donor and patient connected. Sent to hospital for testing and donation

07 May – Digital Data list updated. Along with Mumbai, Nashik and Pune data also now live on website for people in need

08 May – A patient connected with oxygen cylinder through the website data. Confirmed by TL Mansoor

08 May – Pune team managed to get a Plasma donor for a Salesian brother in Pune.