OkCredit launches hyperlocal search tool for medicines, COVID-19 treatment equipment

OkCredit, a part of the Ok network which is an ecosystem of apps aimed at digitising small and medium businesses (SMBs) across India, on Wednesday said it has launched a hyperlocal search tool to look for medicines and critical COVID-19 treatment equipment.

Through a portal co-aid.in, the company will provide real-time information on the availability of medicines pan India besides the contact number of stores for making enquiries, at a time when getting COVID-19 medicines is an onerous task, OkCredit said in a statement.

"The initiative is aimed at helping people access such medicines easily by knowing where they are available. The company is open-sourcing data of over 2 lakh pharmacy stores and businesses on its platform," it added.

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These stores and businesses sell medical products and services such as Fabiflu tablets, oximeters, O2 beds, normal beds, steamers, antibiotics, zinc, vitamins, and oxygen used for treating COVID-19 patients, the company said.

"The data on oxygen and beds have been crowdsourced, whereas the data on medicines is from pharmacy stores on OkCredit's platform," it added.

OkCredit Co-founder and CEO Harsh Pokharna said, "People are overwrought with anxiety, fear, and the unending feeling of helplessness amid rising COVID cases. This is a time for mutual collaboration and leveraging human connection to make the lives of COVID patients and their families a tad easier."

At OkCredit, he added, "We are committed to leveraging our deeper and wider reach within the pharmacy stores and businesses to facilitate the availability of essential drugs and equipment used for treating COVID-19 patients."

OkCredit said it plans to further enhance this simple and easy-to-use portal in the coming days and append it with other COVID-19 critical resources available in the public domain.

"Co-aid.in also allows pharmacy stores and businesses that are not on the OkCredit platform to register themselves on the website," it added.

The company said within 12 days of launching, the website has seen queries from 342 towns and cities, within and outside India. Search queries have also come from New York, Singapore, Seattle and Los Angeles among a number of other international locations.

"In India, the highest searches have come from Bengaluru, Delhi and Kolkata but smaller locations such as Panipat, Muzaffarpur and Ranchi have also used the tool to search for nearby pharmacy shops," it said.

Besides, OkCredit said it has also tied up with Practo to take care of the health needs of its employees during this challenging time of the second wave of the pandemic.