Tale from Kulgam: COVID-19 patient shamed, ASHA abused

KULGAM — Someone has rightly said that we are fighting two pandemics at the same time—one is COVID-19 and the other is stupidity. This sentence was proved right by the villagers of Okey, Kulgam in Kashmir after a 26-year-old local boy’s test came positive for COVID-19 last month.

The boy had travel history of Delhi and had been at home for two days when a local ASHA worker came to know about him. She called one of his family members later in the evening and in the midnight, the boy was taken to the local district hospital in Kulgam for sampling. Unfortunately, the boy came positive and the chaos in the village began with hate comments and confused actions by villagers.

First, it was the boy who became the target of fulmination for getting COVID-19 in the village as if he had AIDS. Later, it was the village ASHA worker who came under the threat and faced consistent abuses from the contacts of the positive case.

When the news of the positive case from the village spread, people boycotted the locals of that very locality. “Nobody came forward to even say a word of support and help, rather they used loudspeakers to spread hatred,” said one of the neighbors of the positive case.

“We also heard the locals saying we will burn this community down to ashes to which the positive case belong,” said one of the relatives of the positive case.

People here need to stop stigmatizing the families, relatives and neighbours of COVID-19 cases because it is highly taking toll on their mental health and relations between the communities.

Another local from Okey said neighbours have many rights on each other as per Islam as well but people torment the same when it comes to practicing.

Alike other frontline workers of the pandemic, ASHA’s are also given responsibility to keep a watch such people who had travelled abroad or were home from other States of the country. So she was doing her job, regardless of any primary health security provided to such workers.

The ASHA was abused verbally and humiliated by locals when she provided the health administration of the district with the contact details of the positive case.

“My son was humiliated just because his mother, that’s me, is working for the betterment and safety of locals. I was abused in the whole market of the village after I provided the details to the health workers. If anybody had no contact with him, they could have told me calmly but they threatened and abused me in-front of whole community,” said the ASHA worker from Okey village.

The ASHA further added that this is not the first time that she has been abused but she has experienced many such cases since she joined her duties. People often held her responsible for every health related issue.

“Once a lady had stillbirth of a baby. They tried to vandalize my home. They also destroyed the hospital property and also beat-up the district hospital staff,” she said, adding that she is clueless about the mentality of villagers because they are now crossing the limits.

Government needs to sensitize the villagers that COVID-19 is not a shame. People have to understand that it can infect anyone unless and until we observe social distancing.