{"id":7299,"date":"2016-03-26T06:41:39","date_gmt":"2016-03-26T01:11:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=7299"},"modified":"2016-03-26T06:41:39","modified_gmt":"2016-03-26T01:11:39","slug":"twitter-trust-how-the-social-network-turned-into-a-covid-19-directory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/13.207.105.184\/?p=7299","title":{"rendered":"In Twitter We Trust: How the Social Network Has Turned into a COVID-19 Directory"},"content":{"rendered":"\nB<\/span>arely a month ago, social media timelines painted a rosy picture of the outside world. The travel influencers were back in action, offices had begun opening their doors to their staff, and talk of vaccines filled timelines with hope. The coronavirus seemed to slowly look like a relic of the past, as restaurants and bars started to fill up, and pictures of friends holidaying together resurfaced on timelines. Many of us, it seemed, had begun to let our guards down after nearly six months in solitude.\n\nThings have, obviously, changed since. As summer hit the sub-continent, the country\u2019s situation took a turn for the worse. By the anniversary of our first nationwide lockdown, it was clear that India was bracing for an even deadlier second wave. Merely days later, this warning quickly manifested itself into a disaster.\n
Many of us, it seemed, had begun to let our guards down after nearly six months in solitude.<\/blockquote>\nCoronavirus cases are now spiralling out of control, and the news is getting grimmer \u2013 we\u2019ve recorded<\/a> the world\u2019s biggest daily spike today with 3.14 lakh cases. Stories of finally escaping months of lockdown have made their way for horrible tales of senior citizens grappling without Oxygen supplies, 30-somethings succumbing to the disease, and vaccinations proving to not be as effective as expected.\n\nThe second wave has already proven to be as deadly than the first, if not more. As confirmed by dozens of concerned healthcare experts on television, and almost every front page headline in the newspapers, we are struggling with a lack of infrastructure to deal with this very sudden surge in infections. News of further lockdowns are now threatening to trigger another migrant crisis, and once again, a massive chunk of the country is back to worrying about where their next paycheck will come from. But while the rise in numbers are evident, these statistics shouldn\u2019t cloud our vision. The reality of the situation, as seen on social media, is a lot more personal.\n
The reality of the situation, as seen on social media, is a lot more personal.<\/blockquote>\nAs COVID-19 hits home for lakhs of families, complaints about having to work from bedrooms and Zoom fatigue, have slowly made way for urgent pleas for hospital beds, Oxygen cylinders, and medicines. Twitter has emerged as the darkest timeline, in this regard, as posts about grandparents with dangerously low saturation levels, and siblings with blood requirements continue to persist day after day. If the message from our healthcare staff over the last year wasn\u2019t clear enough, these personal accounts have been a hard-hitting reminder that India has failed to control the pandemic.\n\nAmid this gloom, however, social media users have stepped up their game. Faced with all these stories of personal tragedy, many have taken it upon themselves to help in whatever way they can \u2014\u00a0even if it\u2019s just to share and amplify as many pleas as possible. This in effect, has ended up turning one particular platform \u2014 Twitter \u2014 into one of this pandemic\u2019s most reliable and helpful resources, over the month of April.\n\nAs breaking news headlines announce that hospitals have been turning patients away, Twitter posts detailing where the few beds are available have been multiplying at an alarming rate. When several states complain of a lack of oxygen, the Twitterverse has stepped in with a list of distributors that have tanks ready to deploy.\n\nPersonalities across the spectrum \u2014 from Sonu Sood<\/a> to Kusha Kapila<\/a> to several hundred micro-influencers \u2014\u00a0have transformed their timelines into Covid directories that can help struggling patients find critical requirements. By simply amplifying these desperate requests, they\u2019ve also been able to assist thousands of suffering patients find plasma donors, or hospital beds.\n\nIt isn\u2019t just influencers who are doing their bit. Those who have pharmaceutical contacts have begun to compile Google docs with information on where to find the life-saving Remdesivir, or hospitals that have ventilators and ICUs at the ready.\n\nOther good samaritans, who don\u2019t necessarily have any healthcare contacts, meanwhile, have been offering whatever services they can. Several have pledged to deliver fresh and healthy meals, some have offered to feed and walk pets who can\u2019t be cared for, and many have offered to clean up the homes of those affected in their spare time. In Hyderabad, law student Ritik Shahi is running errands<\/a> \u2013 delivering groceries and medication \u2013 for those in isolation. In Mumbai, there are many like Twitter user @desimarthastew<\/a> who are preparing meals for those hit by the second wave.\n\nAnd as anyone who has already had Covid-19 can attest, there\u2019s no understating how helpful that could be when down with the sickness.\n\nThat being said, it is important to mention that there are some drawbacks to creating such a large unofficial directory, especially considering how critical the information on offer is. The most obvious \u2014\u00a0not every number that\u2019s shared on Twitter is independently verified before it\u2019s posted, which leads to a lot of back and forth, which those with severe symptoms, don\u2019t necessarily have the bandwidth to deal with.\n\n

Then, of course, is the question of accessibility.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\nThen, of course, is the question of accessibility. It\u2019s a known fact that a large part of the country doesn\u2019t use social media, especially platforms like Twitter. For women, meanwhile, as is often the case in the country, putting up personal information online leads to abuse and harassment, as one woman reminds us in Vice<\/a>.\n\nStill, even taking these drawbacks into account, it\u2019s clear that social media timelines aren\u2019t the same as they were back in February. As the second wave tears apart families, users have used their vast networks to help thousands of critically ill people get help, even if it\u2019s to simply amplify the voices of those in need. So, obviously, while we can\u2019t rely on Twitter to singlehandedly save the country from the pandemic, it\u2019s worth commending the influencers who have proven all through the last month what social media is truly capable of when used the right way. Right now, we need it more than ever.\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As COVID-19 hits home for lakhs of families, complaints on Twitter about having to work from bedrooms and Zoom fatigue have slowly made way for urgent pleas for hospital beds, Oxygen cylinders, and medicines. And the Twitterverse has stepped up, providing details of beds available, preparing a list of oxygen suppliers, compiling Google docs with information on where to find the life-saving Remdesivir and more.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":119,"featured_media":7300,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10108],"tags":[11252,11253,11254,11255,9035,111],"class_list":["post-7299","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-coronavirus","tag-covid-help","tag-influencers","tag-oxygen-cylinders","tag-remdevisir","tag-social-network","tag-twitter"],"yoast_head":"\nIn Twitter We Trust: How the Social Network Has Turned into a COVID-19 Directory<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"As COVID-19 hits home for lakhs of families, complaints on Twitter about having to work from bedrooms and Zoom fatigue have slowly made way for urgent pleas for hospital beds, Oxygen cylinders, and medicines. And the Twitterverse has stepped up, providing details of beds available, preparing a list of oxygen suppliers, compiling Google docs with information on where to find the life-saving Remdesivir and more.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=7299\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"In Twitter We Trust: How the Social Network Has Turned into a COVID-19 Directory\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"As COVID-19 hits home for lakhs of families, complaints on Twitter about having to work from bedrooms and Zoom fatigue have slowly made way for urgent pleas for hospital beds, Oxygen cylinders, and medicines. 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