Humanitarianism and Covid-19

The world humanitarian day is upon us. Every year across the world it is celebrated on the 19th of august. This day is dedicated to humanitarian personnel and to those who died working for other humans and for humanity. This day is a mark of tragic loss when late Mr. Sérgio Vieira de Mello along with his twenty-one colleagues was killed in Baghdad at UN Headquarters.

We are celebrating this day since 2009 but this year it is more special than any other year of the past. This year we did not let the torch of humanity be extinguished. I'm someone who always questioned humanity. I used to believe that there are more bad people on earth than good people. I always believed that altruism and humanity are merely two words that only exist in the dictionary and in social media's hashtags. Even our history didn't give many reasons to believe in humanity. There are so many reasons which can make the human mind question humanitarianism. 

Some of those events are:-

 1) Slavery of humans -  History of slavery goes way back. It was started in the first civilization around 3500 BC.  It was found in almost every other ancient civilization, but in the middle ages, it became less common. still, it didn't stop them from slaving black people and abusing them till their deathbed. It's no longer legal anywhere but through human trafficking around twenty-five to forty million people were into this business till 2013. It generates around $150 billion annually. 

2) Honor Killing- This is the biggest shame of our society. Every year hundreds of women or girls were killed by their own family members for absolutely no reason. In 2010 a girl from Jharkhand named Nirupama was killed because she wanted to get married from a boy of a different caste. In 2016 a 19-year-old girl was killed along with her husband from another caste, by her father. 

Isn't it ironic that we are questioning humanity and we are also the reason for humanity to be questioned?

But now in these past few months, Covid-19 gave us a reason to believe in humanity again. 

This pandemic has killed millions of people across the world. And it's hard to believe that third world countries have fewer cases than the USA or UK. 

Some died from this virus, and others died saving others from this virus. Over hundreds of physicians and nurses gifted their lives to their patients across the world.

As for now, we know that it can be prevented from social distancing, and human beings are social animals and a change in habitat comes with lots of challenges. There's no doubt that this pandemic brought a lot of difficulties with them. And this is directly or indirectly related to humanitarianism.

The first problem we all faced was unemployment which was accompanied by hunger. The small organization was completely wiped out, big organizations were out of business and laid off 30% of their employees, and the hospitality and tourism sector were banned which led to companies like Indigo and Air Asia to lay off their 60% of their cabin crews. In the lockdown period vendors and small shop owners were dying from hunger. People were not able to pay their rent so, personal hygiene was definitely not their first priority. In such a scenario if someone would try to keep their shop open for ten extra minutes they definitely don't deserve to die. 

In the southern part of India, two people a father and a son named Jayraj and Phoenix were killed by local cops for this same reason. But humanity didn't die there. People from all over the world united demanding justice. Few days after their death humanity won, justice was served to them. 

Humanitarianism in Covid-19 doesn't end here. 

People clash all over the world for various indifference like religious beliefs, caste, and race. But in COVID-19 despite their vulnerability, they worked together.  The holy month of Ramadan was also affected by COVID even though Muslims were on a fast they tried hard to fill those who needed it most. Records of Prophet Muhammad, Guidance to humanity, kindness, and benevolence to those related or unrelated have acquired greater relevance now than ever before.

Various NGO's like MCKS food for the hungry foundation situated in New Delhi, India, and The feeding American network distributed 60,000+  every week. With food, hygienic living is also important to survive in this pandemic. As I've mentioned due to low-income people were not able to afford sanitary napkins and masks and soap. Many women and girls lost access to sanitary napkins. A 26 yr old girl from Mumbai named Deane De Merznes distributed 240,000 napkins and to keep up the spirit f humanity NGO's like Give India and Plan International joined hands for the distribution of hygiene kits to the most affected areas and country. 

To help other countries like Serbia, the Indian Air Force started a mission called Sanjeevani to deliver 6.2 tons of medical essentials and a few tonnes of PPE kits. Well, one could say it was their duty even though the government of different countries brought back their stranded citizens but it certainly wasn't a celebrity duty to do so. Sonu Sood, an Indian actor performed a commendable job alone, by sending migrant laborers of different states back to their home. Singers like Selena Gomez, Ariana Grande, Justin Beiber, and musical band Black Pink performed in online concerts to generate funds. And because of their continuous efforts, many people didn't sleep in an empty stomach.

 It's not the first time when humanity has won over pandemics, epidemic, and crisis who to make people each other enemy using various factors like scarcity of food, shelter, or contagious disease like Spanish Flu. It lasted from February 1918 to April 1920 caused by the H1N1 influenza virus which nearly killed 50 million people across the world. 

Generally, most influenza virus kills very you and very old but this virus killed people of working age which caused poverty, malnourishment, overcrowded medical camps, and hospitals and poor hygiene. Even during that time, when the fatality rate was so high people came forward to help the needy. For instance- in Philadelphia a six-week-old baby who had not been bathed for six-day. He was also wet and cold. The family had no money to buy coal. Their other children were hungry too. A nurse from the Nurse society bathed the baby bought coal for the family and also fed other children of that family.

It wasn't only one time, Galveston Texas Hurricane of 1990killed thousands of people leaving nearly entire town homeless. Ursuline sister nuns opened their gates for more than thousand of refugees, black and white. They also tried to calm the terror and provided food, water, medicine, and other essential commodities, 

If in the past humanity can win over inhumane circumstances and events then in present we can also win. Only if we will do it together without any discrimination. If we want to win then,  we need to stay united. We need to work for other people. We need to keep up the spirit of humanity.