Gift will support CARE’s activation of COVID19 field hospitals and care centers, provide oxygen and life saving supplies, and support CARE’s Fast & Fair vaccination campaign
(Atlanta, GA May 13, 2021) — CARE today announced a $10 million gift from #StartSmall, Jack Dorsey’s philanthropic initiative, to support CARE’s fight against the COVID-19 crisis in India, the current epicenter of the pandemic. Over the past week, nearly 400,000 new infections were reported in the country each day. This number is expected to reach 600,000 cases a day before this massive second wave peaks. Nearly a quarter of a million people in the country have already succumbed to the virus.
“The situation in India is truly dire,” says CARE CEO Michelle Nunn. “CARE has been fighting poverty and inequality in India for over 70 years, working through flood and famine. But our team members on the ground agree they have never seen a crisis close to the scale and magnitude of the current situation. Jack Dorsey’s generous gift will enable CARE to continue our life-saving work across the subcontinent and provide desperately-needed medical care to people fighting COVID-19. Additionally, the donation will help ensure that some of the most vulnerable populations across the country have access to the vaccine as part of CARE’s Fast & Fair campaign.”
CARE has been rapidly scaling-up programming in India since the beginning of the current COVID-19 surge. CARE is working in collaboration with the government to open field hospitals and COVID-19 care centers in the states of Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Haryana, Chhattisgarh and Maharashtra. Furthermore, CARE is providing oxygen, PPE and other essential supplies to hospitals in the cities of Delhi, Mumbai, and Bengaluru, as well as across the states of Kerala, Maharashtra, and West Bengal. CARE is also working alongside the government to set up at least 10 oxygen plants across the subcontinent.
Additionally, #StartSmall’s gift will help support CARE’s Fast & Fair vaccination campaign, which aims to provide vaccine assistance for 100 million people around the world. In India, CARE is supporting at least 10 state governments with vaccine rollout and training health workers to address concerns about vaccine stigma and distrust. Vaccine hesitancy is a major challenge, especially in remote areas, due to misinformation, a misplaced belief that people are at low risk, and religious and cultural norms. CARE’s approach to improving vaccine acceptance includes data-driven social and behavior change communications through trusted sources and channels like local news media, tailored to specific issues within each community.
As the world enters the second year of the pandemic, it has become painfully clear that the safety of any person depends on the global community’s ability to protect every person. While wealthy nations have begun inoculating their populations devastatingly lethal variants of the virus continue to emerge around the world where vaccines are scarce. CARE calls on all actors to work together to fight the coronavirus and end the pandemic, once and for all.
For more information contact:
Kalei Talwar
Senior Press Officer, CARE USA
Email: Kalei.Talwar@care.org
Mobile: 808 381 6901