'Please help': Covid tragedy spills onto social media in India

A health worker walks through at a makeshift Covid-19 quarantine facility set up at a banquet hall in New Delhi, India, on Wednesday, April 21, 2021. India now has the world's fastest-growing Covid-19 caseload, adding 259,170 new infections and 1,761 deaths on Tuesday, leaving it behind only the US in terms of total numbers. — Bloomberg

These days, social media posts in India are no longer about cheeky photos, funny memes or political jokes. Instead, frantic calls to save lives are flooding Twitter and Instagram as the latest wave of coronavirus cases and deaths overwhelm the nation’s hospitals and crematoriums.

On Bharath Pottekkat’s Instagram feed, one message screams "Mumbai please help! Lungs damaged due to pneumonia infection. In need of ICU bed.” Another reads "Plasma urgently required for treatment of Covid patient in Max Hospital, Delhi.” More follow. "Urgently needed Tocilizumab injection. Please DM if you know of stock in and around Mumbai.”