Izhaar Hussain Shaikh, an ambulance driver in Mumbai has been working tirelessly to save lives during the COVID-19 crisis. The 30-year-old works for HelpNow, an initiative started by three IIT engineering students in 2019 to help the stretched services of first responders in Mumbai. Here are some images that show Shaikh hard at work.
Izhaar Hussain Shaikh along with his helpers picks up a COVID-19 patient from his home in Mumbai.
It’s a grueling job, with Shaikh’s daily shifts sometimes stretching 16 hours.
Shaikh kisses his son as his mother, right, looks on at a lane outside their house.
“My family, neighbours, everyone is scared. I am frightened too,” said Shaikh to AP. “But I keep telling them and myself that it’s our way of helping people during this time.”
The 30-year-old burns his protective suit after dropping a COVID-19 patient at a hospital.Often he and his two co-workers have to carry the patients by stretcher to their ambulance who live … Read More
Often he and his two co-workers have to carry the patients by stretcher to their ambulance who live in multi-story buildings with no elevators. Mumbai’s relentless heat and humidity make the work all the more physically draining.
But “the real ordeal starts when we reach the hospital,” Shaikh says.
Read LessShaikh chats with a helper as they wait for a call.
Shaikh
says that many times patients die in the middle of the road or while waiting outside the hospital. “After this, we have to take the same patient to the crematorium. This is the saddest moment.”“There have been instances when the patient just doesn’t survive the long waiting hours,” Shaikh adds.“Driving a patient who was alive to the hospital and then driving the same patient a few hours later to his burial or cremation is the hardest part.”
Thankfully, there are times when patients reach at the right time and their lives are spared.A few weeks ago,
Shaikh
had taken an 80-year-old COVID-19 patient to the hospital. She eventually recovered and was brought back home by
Shaikh
. It was a happy moment for him.A moment of rest.
Shaikh takes a break outside a closed shop along with a co-worker.Most of the time he ends up shuffling between hospitals before a patient is finally admitted.
There are times he gets yelled at by doctors who blame him and his team for bringing in patients without first checking in with the hospital.
Shaikh heads upstairs with his team to pick up a COVID-19 patient at their home.The official death toll in Mumbai due to COVID-19 stood at 2,250, the highest anywhere in India.Every bit counts.
In a city with a history of ambulance shortages and where the coronavirus pandemic has claimed nearly 1,300 lives, putting the health care system under immense strain, every bit of help counts.