Washington: India’s welfare is critically important to the United States, said US Vice – President Kamala Harris on Friday. She described the surge of Covid – 19 infections and deaths in India as nothing short of heartbreaking.

US determined to help India in its hour of need, VP Kamala Harris said in her remarks at the State Department’s Diaspora outreach event on US Covid – 19 reliefs for India on Friday. India is struggling with a second wave of the Covid – 19 pandemic with more than 4,00,000 daily new cases being reported in the past few days, and hospitals are reeling under a shortage of medical oxygen and beds. At the beginning of the pandemic, when our hospital beds were stretched, India sent assistance, she said.

Biden administration is determined to help India in its hour of need; she said that the entire Government machinery has been galvanized to help India in this hour of crisis. She also said that, we do this as friends of India, as members of the Asian Quad, and as part of the global community. I believe that if we continue to work together across nations and sectors, we will all get through this,” she added. The Biden-Harris Administration has announced $100 million assistance to India to deal with the Covid – 19 pandemic.

SEWA International USA has raised more than $10 million, American Association of Physicians of Indian-Origin have raised $ 3.5 million and Indiaspora more than $ 2 million, to name some of them. For years, Diaspora groups like Indiaspora and the American India Foundation have built bridges between the United States and India.