NEW DELHI: A Covid-19 helpdesk started by an alumni group of Darul Uloom Madrasa in Deoband has been fighting fake news and misinformation about the disease and its treatment. “We started out by helping arrange hospital beds, oxygen cylinders and free medical counselling for families in need but our primary challenge became a wide range of misunderstandings people had about Covid-19 treatments,” said Mehdi Hasan Aini Qasmi, president, Abna-e-Madaris Welfare Educational Trust, Deoband Alumni Federation. Sharing his experience on types of misinformation their volunteers have been dealing with, Qasmi said that people initially trusted home remedies until their relatives turned critical while some others just didn’t want to get hospitalized due to overburdened health infrastructure. Members of the Deoband Alumni Federation deliver oxygen cylinders in the city after getting them refilled at a station 50 km away near the inter-state border with Uttarakhand.“In some cases, we came across people who feared that they will be given wrong medicines and injections because of their religious identity,” said Qasmi, adding that talking to people and making them understand how Covid-19 is treated became half the battle. “Patients and their family members say the same thing that they read about ‘it’ on social media. Sometimes this misinformation that held them back from proper treatment is communal and sometimes it is ridiculous. In any case, we talk them out of it and explain that they must follow protocol,” said Qasmi. Along with busting Covid-19 myths and fake news, the madrasa alumni has been providing free financial aid and distributing food and air purifying plants in the city. Volunteers of the Covid-19 helpdesk, started by a madrasa alumni group, deliver oxygen cylinders in the city with the help of an e-rickshaw.The Covid-19 helpdesk was started on April 26, in the middle of the Muslim fasting month of Ramazan, in collaboration with Jamia Tibbiya Medical College and an NGO United For Humanity, when the cases started rising in Deoband and a frantic search for resources left people helpless. “So far we have managed to get more than 150 people hospitalized. We visit the patients in the hospital and have also provided financial help for their families in several cases,” said Qasmi. The helpdesk has responded to more than 5,000 calls and messages to date helping arrange over 2,000 oxygen cylinders and medicines including Remdesivir. The madrasa alumni federation has been sending Areca Palm tree to Deoband families who were struck by Covid-19. The plant is known to be an excellent air purifier.The madrasa alumni group has spent over Rs 8 lakh on refilling oxygen cylinders, ration kits, PPEs, medical equipment, free medical camp and medicine distribution along with providing financial aid to 100 families. Since April, the helpdesk run by madrasa alumni has expanded into three more cities namely Shamli, Muzaffarnagar and Saharanpur and now boasts of a 250 strong volunteer network. Not all volunteers are alumni of Darul Uloom Deoband madrasa, some of them are professionals from different walks of life who are helping us arrange resources. A team of Tibbya Medical College doctors, attached with madrasa Covid-19 helpdesk, visit villages near Deoband for health checkups. The helpdesk also provides 24-hour telemedicine support in collaboration with Jamia Tibbiya Medical College. Dr Anwar Saeed who volunteers for the help desk said that now the Tibbya hospital has started sending small teams to nearby villages as well to provide free medical check-ups. “We take their temperature, check their oxygen levels and if there are any Covid-19 symptoms, then we educate them about the next steps to take in the treatment,” said Saeed. “More cases are coming up in rural Deoband. Based on our experience we have been connecting with people in villages and expanding our network to provide beds, medicines and oxygen cylinders,” said Qasim Usmani, United For Humanity, who been supporting the helpdesk.