Mumbai, Apr 22 (IANS): Actress Somy Ali, who runs an NGO called No More Tears in Miami, says that the Covid pandemic has only made her work tougher.

"We have always believed in helping people and while we have helped so many in their times of need, I feel the current time has made it worse. This seems to be a depressive spell where people are feeling low. Also, people are at home and cases of abuse have also gone up," she told IANS.

The actress says that this has been challenging for her NGO, too.

"It's impacted my NGO in the sense that we have never spent so much money on saving lives since our inception, 14 years ago. The call volume for help has been unimaginable and unprecedented. The cases of abuse have been horrific, (there have been) stabbing, rapes, attempted first degree murders. It's been complete hell," she continued.

Somy says that this pandemic needed to be taken seriously from the start.

"It has been emotionally disturbing, depressing and devastating as to how many lives we have lost due to this virus. These pandemics are not a new phenomenon, and there were many ways lives could have been protected. Be it our public not taking it seriously or our politicians making light of it, it is pretty disgusting to see how downplayed this was when we came to learn of its existence," she says.

The former Bollywood actress says she believes in leading by example when it comes to following Covid protocol.

"I have worn masks throughout, have been vaccinated as well and am getting a Covid test every two weeks. I am not doing this just for me, but these precautions are necessary to protect the women, children and men I rescue on a daily basis," she said.