From providing creative education to rural children to inventing devices to terminate coronavirus - top Social Stories of the week

Nineteen-year-old motor enthusiast Jasper Paul’s life changed after he met a 98-year-old woman, who was ill and injured and was lying on the road. He helped her and several such destitutes in Hyderabad, and also founded his own NGO ‘Second Chance Foundation’.

Working on similar lines is Toronto-based non-profit organisation Unstructured Studio that aims to provide children in rural India with creative education through its ZubHub platform.

This week, SocialStory saw many inspiring stories of such individuals, NGOs, and non-profits that aim to help others in distress.

Here are the top Social Stories of the week:

Meet Jasper Paul, who has rehabilitated over 1,500 destitutes in Hyderabad

Nineteen-year-old Jasper Paul — a Hyderabad-based student — was a motor enthusiast. However, his passion for speed failed him when he met with a tragic accident on a highway. One day, while the then engineering student was passing by the Secunderabad Railway Station, he came across a 98-year-old woman, who was lying on the road — ill and injured — so much so that maggots were eating up her wound. 

He shared a video of the woman on social media, and in no time, many people connected with him, and he was able to put her in an old age home. In fact, she could also meet her family, who resided in a village in Telangana and were looking for her.

After helping many such people for over three years, Jasper founded his own NGO ‘Second Chance Foundation’ in 2017 as he believed everybody deserves a second chance, just like he did.

This Toronto-based non-profit provides creative education to over 2000 children in rural India

India has over 146 million children enrolled in rural elementary schools, which often lack resources, network connectivity, etc. For this reason, most teachers only focus on completing the basic education as they too lack creative expression in their pedagogy.

As a result, these children are often devoid of opportunities that help them better their creativity. According to LinkedIn, the top skill for 2020 was defined as ‘Creativity’ among the top 15 skills that employers want.

Toronto-based non-profit organisation Unstructured Studio aims to provide children in rural India with creative education through its ZubHub platform.

Quitting my addiction has boosted my confidence and mental health

My name is Lakshaya, and I am a 26-year-old waiter living in Mumbai. I first became addicted to chewing tobacco at the age of 17. I had just broken up with my girlfriend and went into depression. I soon became addicted and the habit became my crutch to cope with my loneliness.

Within a few years, I started feeling the ill effects of the habit. I started getting pain in my chest, acidity, and my breath smelled very bad. I also had recurring headaches. Despite trying numerous times to quit the habit, I struggled and eventually returned to chewing tobacco. 

When the headaches became intolerable, I decided to visit a doctor, who, realising the seriousness of my condition, referred me to the de-addiction counselling programme at LIfeFirst.

Read about Lakshaya's story here.

This 18-year-old tinkerer’s innovation can ‘terminate’ coronavirus from surfaces

The COVID-19 pandemic has led to many people prioritising their hygiene. Over the last two years, several innovations have also been launched to help people maintain their hygiene at a larger but easier scale.

One among them is Mihir Vardhan, a second-year student of Engineering at the University of Illinois, USA.

A passionate tinkerer, he has created the ‘Terminator’ series, devices that work on the principles of UV disinfection.

The 18-year-old from Gurugram has come up with three innovations – Terminator Mega, Terminator Mini, and Terminator Turbo. These devices disinfect surfaces and objects to help people fight the coronavirus.

How One Health will mitigate endemic zoonotic infections

One Health is a multi-sectoral approach that takes into consideration human, animal, and environmental health, and the interconnectivity and interdependence of these three elements.  

In the past, we have seen disease outbreaks with major implications on the social and economic landscape of the nation. These outbreaks were witnessed with the emergence of new infections, re-emergence of existing diseases that are often neglected, detection of antimicrobial resistance at the human-animal-environment interface, and influence of climate change on vector-borne diseases and vector epidemiology. 

In India and globally, the One Health approach is recognised, and implemented to achieve quality human health and the development of social and environmental ecosystems. 

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