Hope Foundation receives €120,000 funding to help fight Covid-19 in India

Since 2008, the Cork-based foundation has been running a hospital in Kolkata which is currently a Covid-19 hotspot.

Hope Foundation distributing food packs and offering medical support to communities in Kolkata, India. Pictured here is the late Geeta Venkadakrishnan, director of the Hope Foundation. Picture: Hope Foundation/Twitter

The Hope Foundation has been awarded €120,000 Government funding to support the running costs of their hospital in Kolkata, India.

Since 2008, the Cork-based foundation has been running a hospital in the city which is currently a Covid-19 hotspot.

All three wards of the hospital have been converted into Covid wards.

On Sunday, India reported 403,738 confirmed cases, including 4,092 deaths.

Overall, India has over 22 million confirmed infections and 240,000 deaths. Experts say both figures are undercounts.

Government hospitals are unable to cope with the most recent surge of the coronavirus and the Hope Hospital is currently running at full capacity.

In an update this week, the Hope Foundation said that when the pandemic is over there will be very few families in the city who will not have suffered a loss.

They said the city is in partial-lockdown and daily labourers, migrant workers and their families are running out of food.

Confirming the funding from the Irish government, Minister for Foreign Affairs, Simon Coveney, said: "This support from Irish Aid will enable them to cover the vital running costs of the hospital - from the frontline doctors and nurses treating the sick, to nutritious foods which will help patients recover.

The work of the Hope Foundation epitomises Irish compassion. I am proud that a Cork-based organisation is able to help the most marginalised communities through this darkest hour.

The foundation expressed gratitude this week for the "staggering generosity" of Irish people in response to their appeal.

Fundraising efforts have reached the current goals for PPE for hospital staff, hand sanitiser, food for patients, oxygen cylinders, ventilators, a new air conditioning unit and a cardiac monitor.

The foundation is still seeking donations to cover the running costs of the hospital and for food packs. Those seeking to donate can do so here.

Extra work has begun to reach struggling families to provide food packs and medical support from the hospital and night-watch ambulances.

"To all our donors, new and longstanding, please be assured, that even in the face of such emergency right now, we are not forgetting our vital pre-Covid work with the children and their communities in the streets and slums, the children in our protection homes, our child sponsorship and much more," a statement from the foundation said.

"These communities have been decimated by Covid and they still need us, now more than ever."