Text: Nikolaos Papadopoulos
Pictures: Lauren Megarry
As we know, the COVID 19 pandemic has adversely affected most countries around the world. While many countries seem to be cautiously emerging out of it, India is in the epicentre with over 400000 daily new cases, while Denmark currently stands at around 1000.
This prompted Kari Doyle, principal at Viking School in Copenhagen, to undertake a commendable initiative: she decided to raise awareness amongst the school’s community and provide substantial help to the people suffering in India. As a result, the school’s teachers are actively involved in educating the students about the crisis and the necessity of medical supplies.
Many of the school’s students originally hail from India, and they and their families know many people there who are impacted by COVID. This made Kari’s appeal even more powerful and led to students as young as 5 or 6 creating posters and videos promoted through the school’s social media channels.
“Many of the school’s students originally hail from India, and they and their families know many people there who are impacted by COVID.”
The ultimate goal behind this endeavour was conceived with the help of an Indian acquaintance of Kari. They introduced her to the Hemkunt Foundation, an organisation based in India that has set up a crowdfunding campaign for purchasing oxygen concentrators – equipment critical in fighting the pandemic. The Foundation purchases and distributes it to organisations working in the field.
While the initiative is still very young, and it is hard to measure its success due to the crowdfunding campaign being global, there is a very positive response from the school’s community. The feelings of excitement and approval surrounding this effort, echoed by the community’s enthusiastic reaction on social media, makes Kari very hopeful about the future.
If you would like to donate, you can visit Viking International School’s Facebook page.