‘Want people in India to know they aren’t alone’

WASHINGTON: Dr Ashutosh “Ash” Tewari was himself in an intensive care unit (ICU) for two weeks, battling for life against Covid-19. He then watched his childhood best friend die of the illness after being turned down by multiple hospitals in India that were either running short of doctors or medical supplies.

The chair of the department of urology at New York’s Mount Sinai hospital is now determined help India fight the Covid-19 epidemic that has been described by medical experts as four times more devastating than the first.

“I want people in India to know they are not fighting this alone, and we are with them,” said Dr Tewari, who came to the US from Kanpur in the 1990s.

Along with Michael J. McCarry, senior vice president of perioperative services, Tewari has led Mount Sinai hospital’s assistance to India.

The hospital has sent 25 ventilators, and 100 sleep apnea machines with kits to convert them to ventilators, along with other medical equipment to India through chartered flights in three separate shipments.

The hospital has said it also plans to donate 10 Crossvent 3+ ventilators and 15 Medtronic 840 ventilators.

The ventilators, oxygen devices and other supplies will be divided into 5 pallets to be shipped to five public hospitals in Mumbai, Delhi, Kanpur, Kolkata and Bengaluru.

Dr Tewari’s foundation — The Global Prostate Cancer Research Foundation — has also purchased disposable supplies for 100 patients.

Mount Sinai hospital has said this relief effort is specially “dear to his (Dr Tewari’s) heart” as he has seen many relatives and friends suffer and die.